#Microblog Monday 207: Teaching Stillness
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Pascal said, “All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” All? I’d probably argue over the word “all” since it makes a lot of assumptions about humanity’s capacity to create or solve problems. But it is a value skill: to sit alone with your thoughts and no other distractions.
I am pretty good with this even if I struggle with meditation. I can sit quietly with my thoughts easier than I can clear my mind of thoughts.
Like I can sit in silence on a bus for hours and stare out the window. Or in a room; I’m good in a room with complete silence and a good wall to stare at. No one taught me how to do this; it just naturally occurred. I remember driving cross-country as a child and staring out the car window for days on end without a need for a Walkman or book.
And the twins are pretty good with this, too — especially the ChickieNob. I didn’t teach them; they just started doing it. But as I move through all of these attention-building or bettering exercises this year, I keep wondering if this is something that can be taught. That should be taught. Should we teach people how to sit silently without distraction for long periods of time?
Are you good at being alone with your thoughts and no distractions?
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11 comments
I actually love a good “sit and think” session without distractions … although it needs to be applied flexibly for me as too much of it can do my head in for sure.
That all sounds like meditation to me! Sitting on a special cushion and attempting to clear your mind is not mediation. Actually trying to clear your mind is counterproductive to clearing your mind, bahahahaha. Sorry, just some Buddhist humor. Meditation can be done sitting on a bus or in a car, riding a bike, sweeping the floor, folding the laundry, doing a simple craft, doing yoga, taking your shoes off…
I totally believe doing nothing, breathing meditation, and other forms of stillness should be taught. The only time my son is doing nothing and being still is in the car, but then he often wants to chat. I am working on teaching him breathing exercises and yoga. One day he will just climb a tree and sit there watching to world for an hour like i did as a kid.
I am. Yes. I can sit quietly for hours and be comfortable in my own company. But, I don’t know if someone can be taught this.
I am good with being alone with my thoughts. But I’ve noticed my kids aren’t and we are working with training them as I do think it’s an incredibly important and valuable skill. And many of the younger generation are not as good at it as they haven’t been given the opportunity and rewarded for doing this training.
And I do agree with you: I don’t think “all” of humanity’s problems stem from an inability to be alone with our thoughts. But there are an awful lot of them.
Of course I have to frequently keep my thoughts away from the “over-reacting” stressful ones. But I love being still and quiet. That’s what I love about meditation is that it makes you realize how much deeper your understanding of and connection with yourself really can come from silence and stillness.
Yes! It’s part of my daily routine. Keeps me sane. In fact, I’m really, really good at tuning out the noise around me and tuning in.
That is a great skill that absolutely should be developed by those who don’t have it. I think about my students, who have grown up in a time of instantaneous-ness and fast transitions and never being “bored,” and I feel like they could use this ability to sit still and absorb the silence and the things around you. I used to be better at it, to sit and stare out the window or get lost in my thoughts without having my thoughts turn on me and send me down spirals of worry, but I’m working on that. We love to take car trips and just talk to each other — notice the outside, and take it as captive time for conversation about absolutely anything. It’s really nice, actually.
I am absolutely not good at being alone with my thoughts. This sounds foreign to me: ” I remember driving cross-country as a child and staring out the car window for days on end without a need for a Walkman or book.” Except for when I’m meditating, my mind needs something to chew on.
I’m curious how you would go about teaching it.
The first time I realised I was good at this was when I went shopping with my mother, and at one stage I had to wait in the car for her. I waited a long time (she was finishing the Christmas shopping), and she commented when I came back that my sisters would have gone crazy waiting. I think she was right.
I do think it is something to do with our different natures though. My father was very still, and patient. I’m more like him. So I never had to learn it. Though I think teaching people/children not to panic when they’re alone, and giving them some tools to cope with it, would be helpful. Of course, with cellphones with us all the time now, all the younger generations may never have to learn it.
I’m not sure how well I am alone with my thoughts, but I do well enough on a train which is a kind of alone.
I missed #MM last week, but couldn’t resist responding to this. 🙂
I think I am reasonably good at being alone with my thoughts. I grew up in an age where there were a lot fewer distractions than there are today — one TV channel till I was 14 years old, no Internet, no video games, no cellphones or computers, and a lot of long road trips with only the radio & each other as a distraction and maybe a book (I am one of the fortunate ones who can read in a car without getting sick). Even so, there was a lot of staring at the scenery out the window.