If I sit and stare at a blank page, thinking and conjuring up what I might write, even if I don’t write a single word, I consider it a tremendous success.
Where most people see a waste of time, what I see is a chunk of time dedicated to thinking and conjuring things up. Something that, by definition, takes time and undisrupted focus.
Something that, you must understand, looks precisely like sitting and staring.
Something that, in today’s world, is becoming increasingly rare because it’s uncomfortable and can be instantly avoided with a few taps of the fingers.
But for someone to lean into that uncomfortable feeling… to have the discipline to not submit to passive entertainment… to be proactive enough to silence notifications, close all tabs, and clear the calendar of appointments… all so that they can have some space and time to think… so that they can digest all of the crap that has ceaselessly entered their mind from the second they woke up that morning (not including the backlog of crap from the many mornings prior)… so that they can just settle and move towards clarity… is nothing short of a victory.
And to do so for an hour, several hours, or even half an hour… should be seen as one and nothing less.