What’s been working pretty well, injury-avoidance-wise, is to pay attention to my body the way I would in yoga class, or Pilates. As I snip off sprigs of wild arugula, I imagine that I’m allowing my spine to lengthen between head and tailbone. As I lean over the blueberry bush, hunting for ripe berries, I let the lean become a lunge and feel the stretch. As I haul out the hose, I remind myself to contract my abdominal muscles, protecting my back by engaging my core. I remind myself to notice where I need to adjust, moment by moment, to keep my body safe.

I’m also realizing that gardening while rushed is usually an exercise in frustration and annoyance. (You could make the same point about yoga class, and maybe about doing anything while rushed.) My “quick trips” through the garden are never quick, something I’m working on accepting. Better to let the plants go thirsty a few extra days, than to try to squeeze in the watering on a crowded or imminent-deadline day. As I give myself permission to quit watching the clock, I get to reap more of that benefit that gardeners talk about, the absorption and flow.

I’m quick to take a (long, long) break when I’m creatively stuck. But when my body needs a breather, I keep pushing.

It puzzles me, how I won’t pause and rest when I’m gardening or cleaning house or sitting at the computer. I like breaks. But stopping to rest just because my body is asking me to, feels like a big bother. It takes too long! I’ll lose my place! It’s inefficient! I have to get this thing done!

I’m especially aware of this tendency right now because it’s the time of year when there’s a lot to harvest in the garden. (Blueberries! Wild arugula!)  I’m doing more bending and twisting than usual. If I’m careless, I feel it for days.

What would it be like just to stand up and stretch whenever I notice the urge? Even if this makes the project take longer?

I experimented with this the other day while cleaning out the bathtub, which is a good chore to practice with because it’s time-limited and you can clearly see when you’re finished.

I paid attention to the cues—even before any soreness set in, just the little mental message that said, “You know, this would be a good time to do something different.” Noticed that I didn’t want to. Stood up anyway. Shook myself out, got back to work.

Though I was kind of annoyed by these interruptions, they didn’t make the tub-cleaning any more onerous. My back and neck felt OK the next day. And the amount of time the breaks added to the total task was practically imperceptible. Huh.

Applying the slowed-down approach to gardening, or to sitting at the computer, is a more advanced level—those activities have fluid boundaries and are more fraught.

Next step: See what it’s like to garden while being responsive to my body’s cues for, say, 45 minutes. What kinds of signals tell me I need to pause and change what I’m doing? What’s it like to make that change? Does my impatience continue, go away, take on a different cast? Does the weeding or watering or harvesting take that much longer with breaks? If so, what is that like? How do I feel physically, right then and the next day?

And if I find myself resisting a break, what’s going through my mind? What happens after that?

I want to be more aware of my reaction to my body’s signals—observing the mental sequence, the anticipated consequences, the actual consequences, for a concrete period of time. I guess you could say that I’m opening negotiations between my impatience and my body’s need for a healthier response, and this is the fact-finding phase.

“It FEELS like this writing assignment is impossible, therefore it IS impossible. I FEEL uncertain about how to design this workshop, therefore I will fail. I FEEL frustrated because I don’t see an answer to this creative problem, therefore there IS no answer for it.”

That’s emotional reasoning in action. I’ve been thinking about this concept since reading When in Doubt, Make Belief, about coping with obsessive-compulsive disorder, OCD for short. Mental health is a continuum, and though I don’t have OCD, I’m seeing a lot of myself in this book—I can certainly get unproductively obsessive about things (when in doubt, make lists!), and I let anxiety run the show more often than I would like.

Author Jeff Bell, who has the disorder, writes about the way that compulsive, repetitive behavior provides temporary emotional relief for someone with OCD. An example might be checking the stove burners seven times in succession, then going back to check them yet again. The rational mind knows this behavior is unnecessary, even counterproductive, but the emotions aren’t buying it.

Emotional reasoning plays a large and stubborn role in my creative life. I don’t check the stove burners, but I do get swept up in the discouraging messages from the hollering emotions. It’s tempting to respond by avoiding the project that’s frustrating me, which buys me temporary relief but reinforces the power of emotions to derail me in the future.

Bell recommends mindfulness—steady, nonjudgmental awareness—as one way of coping better with emotional reasoning and the nonproductive impulses it can lead to. When you observe the anxiety instead of giving in to the obsessive (or in my case, escapist) urge—when you sit it out until the anxiety dissipates—you gradually habituate to the anxiety. Over time, the painful feelings that you would do anything to avoid become less dominant, less threatening.

Over time: there’s the rub. Often the anxiety does not dissipate soon enough for me. Often it gets worse before it gets better. I have been known to use this phenomenon as a further reason to delay action: “See? I was right not to want to get started! Who in their right mind would choose to do something that feels this awful?” But according to the cognitive therapists, seeing the awfulness as unbearable is a thinking habit that I’m mixing up with reality.

Naming the mission

Part of it has to do with how I frame the issue. That’s why having a name for it—emotional reasoning—is helpful. I’m in the habit of focusing on the goal: “How can I feel better right now?” A more useful goal (or frame) could be: “How can I practice a different way of dealing with frustration and anxiety right now? Am I willing to habituate to these feelings so they don’t bug me so much, don’t run the show?”

This second goal is more challenging. It means drawing on a different set of mental muscles, carving out a new mental groove. Hard work! But potentially healthier…and might even, potentially, lead to feeling better over the long term.

As with my coaching clients, I’m not aiming for a sudden about-face—that’s not a sustainable way to deal with a longstanding habit. But I have found that huge shifts can come out of a simple beginning: increasing the amount of time between the impulse to react in the default way, and the reaction itself. Micro-lengthening that bit of time between impulse and default reaction starts to change things in profound ways.

I think this is another way of looking at my take on the Pomodoro Technique (for me, micro-sessions of work alternating with longer rest periods) and why it’s been helping. The feelings aren’t derailing me so much; I’ve been focusing better. Now I’m examining the frame: changing the goal from “Make the feelings go away” to “Practice habituating to the feelings, so they’re less fearsome and not so much in charge.”

Behaviorally, this translates into: When the unpleasant creative-frustration-uncertainty-avoidance cluster pushes its way into consciousness, notice it. Sit with it. It would be nice to say, until it dissipates, but that may still be longer than I’m willing to tolerate. I’m starting by increasing the amount of time I sit with those feelings—pause, breathe—before running away.

I’m recently back from a mini-vacation in Western Sonoma County. Ahhhh—a delightful mix of low-key busy-ness (I milked a goat! and bought cucumber-scented face cream!) and stillness (strolling the beach, sitting outside in the morning mist.)

Since I got back, I’ve been looking for ways to keep up with a morning routine that I know works for me: meditate for 15 or 20 minutes first thing, then step outside for a few minutes. Then have a light breakfast, then take a look at my intentions for the day.

When I follow this routine, it doesn’t guarantee a smooth day. But it generally makes for one that feels less fragmented.

More often, though, my daily routine goes: check email, check online forums, check Twitter, read paper, deal with more email, eat breakfast at lunchtime, deal with phone calls and (seemingly) urgent assignments, eventually squeeze in some meditating, go outside late afternoon (oh! there is a world out there!), work late into the evening.

I wouldn’t mind this pattern if it felt like a natural rhythm, but it feels more like an accidental or drifty one.

Here’s the key:

When I spend the first part of the day in front of the computer, my agenda gets set by the instruments of distraction.

To resist the computer’s siren song, I need something better than the grit-my-teeth-and-fight-it method. I need a substitute activity that’s simple and inherently rewarding.

I’ve tried combining steps 1 and 2 by meditating in a nearby park, but that brings up its own set of questions and distractions (is the noisy leaf-blower guy working today? should I put on sweats or street clothes? should I go to the dry cleaner, as long as I’m headed that way?)—until, overwhelmed, I turn to the default option and get lost online.

This past week, I’ve added a new element to the morning routine. First thing in the morning, I’ve been walking out to the back stairs of my apartment building, and sitting outside on the stairs while I meditate. It’s easier than getting myself to the park, and there are trees and birds out back, just like on vacation!

The rest of the day is going better.

I spent a day and a half in Sebastopol, one of my favorite places. It’s an environment conducive to slowing down—to the degree that I found myself doing things like setting my wallet on the bakery counter and then wandering away. (The wallet stayed where I left it. Good wallet! Good people!)  I strolled the Zen garden at Osmosis. I went to bed early.

I’d brought along the book Sabbath: Restoring the Sacred Rhythm of Rest. It’s a meditation on the danger of focusing on accomplishment at the expense of dormancy, and full of musings on the delights of rest. I opened it to the chapter “Selling Unhappiness,” which seems well-timed for the end of the Christmas shopping season, and for setting intentions in the New Year.

Author Wayne Muller talks about the illusion of Sabbath time that’s portrayed in innumerable ads—of carefree, attractive people at leisure, relaxed and happy. We long to be like those fictional people, and we imagine that if we buy what the ads are selling, we can have a bit of their lives. Except, writes Muller:

“While they are promising happiness, they are really selling dissatisfaction. Our entire economy is predicated upon dissatisfaction. If we are satisfied, we do not need more than we already have…

“Instead of buying the new coffee maker, make coffee in the old one and sit with your spouse on the couch, hang out—do what they do in the picture without paying for it. Just stop. That is, after all, what they are selling in the picture: people who have stopped. You cannot buy stopped. You simply have to stop.”

Stopping is easier during this quiet week; it’s easier when I’m away from my usual routine. I want to build more rest into my life. I’m starting with turning off my computer in the evenings. Maybe I’ll add naps in the afternoon. Where will you pause today?

Have a delightful new year.

I was struck by the term even as I wrote it—not inner critic or inner editor, but Doomsayer! What strikes me as especially apt about this name is that by her very nature, the inner doomsayer is never appeased. Her fears will not be allayed! This says a lot about the gear-grinding and exhaustion that happen when I write and edit.

Any time I puzzle over how to phrase a passage or make a concept clear, the inner doomsayer can find something wrong with every possible option. If I phrase it this way, the doomsayer predicts that the editor will hate it. Phrase it this other way, and the source I interviewed will be annoyed. Phrase it a third way, and readers will be confused. The fourth option doesn’t meet Strunk & White’s standards.

The inner doomsayer sees the flaws in every possibility—not only sees them, but works her darnedest to make sure no flawed alternative (i.e., no alternative at all) gets through. Immobilizing. No wonder I can’t get momentum.

So I’m working on reinterpreting my task, nowadays, when I get stuck. My task is not to find a solution that will please the doomsayer. That route, searching for the solution she’ll be okay with, is what gets me tangled up in an hour’s worth of agonizing over one paragraph. Instead, I need to recognize when it’s her talking, and let her words go by.

This approach seems related to the split-screen technique—a facet of it—but there’s something about acknowledging the doomsayer and her inability to ever be reassured that carries special power.

As encouraging as this insight is, what I’ve been finding as I try to apply it is that identifying her as the doomsayer is really hard! I’m so used to her voice that it still sounds like reality to me. I’m used to struggling and struggling in search of flawless phrasing and structure—it’s an old, old habit.

I’m committed to continuing in the practice of this simple, terribly difficult, potentally liberating task:

Notice when it’s the inner doomsayer talking. Don’t try to allay her fears. Let her words fly by.

Yes! There were shifts. (Having to do with gently meeting my demons rather than running scared from them.) And warm connections made with a small group of smart, gutsy, interesting people. And commitments!, and emotional stretching.

The workshop was at a conference/retreat center with beautiful grounds. Rhododendrons in full bloom, the scent of eucaluptus in the air.

When we said our goodbyes at 4:00, I was aware of the urge to head straight home, what with that long to-do list waiting. My mind began to whir in its busy-controlling-everything way, planning out how, on the short walk back to the car, I could turn on my phone and check for messages, then dig out my car keys, then find my sunglasses, then decide which CD would best fit my mood—because God forbid I should waste any time dealing with these earth-shattering tasks while standing still after I got to the car.

My mind whirred, and I walked slowly in the other direction, toward the rhododendrons. I sat on a bench in the sun for a few minutes. Then I ambled to the car. Did my earth-shattering tasks—phone messages, keys, sunglasses—one at a time, beside the car. Drove home in silence—no CD—letting the effects of the day sink in.

I noticed a cluster of cream-colored poppies on a highway median, and the dome of a synagogue as I crested a hill.

When I got home, I sat in my bay window and wrote about the day.

Slowly and quietly, I transitioned from reflective retreat mode to busy city mode.

My wonderful friend Havi says that in yoga class, Savasana—the pose where you lie down quietly at the end, to integrate what has happened during the class—is the most important part of the session. I don’t always allow myself integration time, in life. I did last weekend.

As I start another weekend—this one packed with appointments and expectations and opportunities—what spaces will I allow myself? Instead of lurching from one thing to the next, am I willing to let my experiences sink in?

But reading is a good thing! Fuels the imagination, creates empathy, promotes critical thinking. And carrying articles around in case you get stuck in line at the post office—efficient!

But I read so that I don’t ever have to be bored.

This pattern is not new. I spent much of middle school with a book strategically hidden, open, under my desk. I spent much of my youth in a dreamy haze, dwelling in Madeleine L’Engle’s world, or Austen’s.

I don’t read much fiction anymore, except on vacation—since I’ve been self-employed, I can’t afford to check out that way, or to stay up all night finding out how the story ends. With fiction, I’m a binge-reader.

So now it’s nonfiction, where keeping my distance is easier. During every solo meal. As with reading while waiting in line, it feels efficient.

The first time I went on a meditation retreat (I didn’t know it was going to be a meditation retreat, but that’s a story for another time), we were asked midway through to spend a day and a half in silence.  No eye contact. NO READING. NO JOURNALING. Just me and my thoughts.

Didn’t know if I’d make it. I did, and even—to my surprise—was able to move past some old pain by gently facing it without distraction. (Note, however: approaching meditation with the goal of Having a Breakthrough kind of defeats the purpose.) Afterward, felt more peaceful. Senses more acute.

So, back to that fear of being bored. Coupled with anxiety about wasting time, and the compulsion to maximize every moment.

Leo’s post reminds me of the classic, and more insidious time-waster: missing my life as moments rush by while I’m focused on something else.

What if, when I ate my meals, I just ate? Just for the next 3 days (not 30, sorry Leo)? What would it be like to pay attention to eating, the way I do on retreat?

Tried it this morning. Um, not fun. Found myself not savoring, but eating faster than usual, so I could Get On With The Day. Ironically, the reading-while-eating habit relaxes me and slows down my eating speed, a healthy thing, even as it means I can’t tell you whether what I ate was delicious or not.

Nevertheless, mindful eating feels like something worth staying with. For 3 days. Then if I go back to reading-while-eating, perhaps I can do it out of choice, not fear.

Am I the soul of patience? Nope.

But I’m more patient than I used to be. I don’t finish other people’s sentences as often. (I still do it, but not as often.) I interrupt people less. (Or, later in the conversation, anyway.) I’m more deliberate about the things I say, even when emotions are running high.

An example of a time I’m not patient is when I’m online, waiting for a page to load. While recognizing the absurdity of this impatience—having to wait FOUR WHOLE SECONDS for information it used to take hours of research to uncover—I’m startled by its intensity. When results aren’t instant, I’m overcome with frustration. Neck tight, shoulders hunched. And when I get that page-not-available message, and have to hit Refresh? Rage. Cursing. Ranting.

When not ranting, I’ve been feeling bemused by all the energy that goes into resenting the time it takes for information to come to me, practically instantly but not fast enough, over the Web.

And it occurred to me: What if I used those moments of computer-generated waiting as breaks—all those breaks I mean to take while I’m working, but don’t get around to? For ergonomically healthy stretches? For perspective shifts? Meditation teachers advise using the ringing phone as a reminder to breathe—I never could do it, too worried about missing the call—here’s an adaptation that might work for me.

Now, this may be one of those great-sounding ideas that’s impossible to carry out. Electronic devices keep me hooked. But I like the thought of sidestepping frustration, while at the same time interrupting that powering-through habit, and the physical strain and boxed-in thinking that go with it.

Nothing too complicated, or I’ll forget. And I won’t ask myself not to feel impatient. Just, when my browser is loading…close my eyes and take a few slow breaths. When I see the page-not-available message…stand up, look away from the computer, stretch. (Say! I could hit Refresh and then do this! To save time! Ack!)

Can’t hurt to try. I’ll let you know how it goes.

In the new book, Zimbardo and co-author/researcher John Boyd use what they call “time perspective”—a person’s attitude toward past, present and future—as a lens on behavior, decision-making, health and (nothing less than) happiness.

The ideal time perspective, according to Zimbardo and Boyd, includes a strong, positive connection to your past (enjoying good memories and reframing unhappy ones); a practical but not obsessive view of the future (planning and action toward your goals, without sacrificing well-being or important relationships); and a healthy enjoyment of the present (without letting unbridled self-indulgence run the show).

The book is an engaging read, even though parts of it sound a bit like Self-Help 101. I took Zimbardo’s survey (it’s in the book and also online) to find out my own time perspective, and on most measures, I’m close to average. Which means I could improve on making peace with the past, delaying gratification, and indulging in more wholehearted goofing off. (The last two are not mutually exclusive—the authors also recommend flexibility and a willingness to shift perspectives as needed.)

As I scanned the suggestions for making these shifts, I kept thinking, These are things I’m already doing. Call a friend from high school (past). Track your progress toward a goal (future). Play with a little kid, tell a joke, toss a Frisbee (present).

Then it dawned on me that many of those suggestions are things I think of myself as doing—even if I don’t do them all that consistently.

An object lesson in time perspective

So there I was yesterday, racing toward the streetcar stop on my way to a class, when a nice silver-haired couple asked me where to catch a particular bus. I didn’t know, and I told them so, then gave them my best guess, which is that the stop they wanted was about a mile down the street. With a friendly smile, off I ran.

As I took my seat on the streetcar, I thought, I’ve got a map of the city transit system. I could have taken a few minutes, unfolded the map and shown them the exact route of the mystery bus. Turns out the stop they wanted wasn’t a mile away but close by. Oops.

My Bad Samaritan moment

Zimbardo and Boyd mention an oft-cited study of Princeton seminary students who were asked to prepare a short talk. As each student headed across campus to give the talk, some were told they were running late; others were told they had a little extra time. On the way, each student passed a man (actually in league with the experimenters), slumped in an alley, coughing and apparently in need of help. Ninety percent of the students who were in a hurry failed to stop and help — and that included the seminarians, ironically, who’d prepared a talk on the Good Samaritan.

The irony of my own situation:  The class I was rushing to yesterday was a Feldenkrais class,  in which you learn to ease physical pain and stiffness through movement sequences done mindfully and very…very… slowly.

Not to make too much of the incident—the day was sunny, the couple looked fit, there were lots of people around who may well have given them the directions they needed. I’m pretty sure they eventually found their bus.

But still. How many opportunities for connection do I miss when I’m rushing?

Practice giving the gift of time to others, advise Zimbardo and Boyd.

Never mind Frisbee. This is the kind of present-focus I could use more of.