I’m the work hard, play hard type.
I have a hard time letting myself relax and play if I haven’t gotten my work done for the day first.
And once I’ve completed my work or exhausted whatever energy I had towards it, I try and cut loose from it completely and relax and play fully—I try not to let work bleed into play.
That said, I’m usually doing one or the other: working or playing. And what I recognized in myself just yesterday is that there’s a third option that I’m skipping over altogether: being.
While this might sound new-age-y… here’s what I mean: after work this past Saturday, I came home and did some additional work that I had on my to-do list. I lasted around 2 hours before I completely zonked out from fully depleted mental energy.
But, it was too early for me to “play hard” and so I found myself in this unusual gap where I didn’t have the mental energy to work, but didn’t hit the time in my schedule where I could play.
And then it occurred to me…
This is precisely the kind of time gap that I’ve been hoping for. A time where I had nothing pressing that needed to get done so that I could practice being present—aka meditating for extended periods of time.
And so I tried it.
I sat in my backyard, eyes closed, for double the time I would normally sit—40 minutes. And just practiced being. It was quite refreshing and something I think needs to be added to the work hard, play hard formula. At least it’ll be something I add to mine.