By Halcyon
Life is hard. From the moment we open our infant eyes to the blinding white of a delivery room until we follow that light to places unknown, it seems there’s always something trying to stand in our way. There are days when all you want to do is give in, let it take over, and be swept away to anywhere but here. In her new series The Awakening, Halcyon hopes that giving us a lifeline will help us find our way back.
The Awakening: Being Here (Part II)
If we move too fast, we’ll break things. If we move too slow, we’ll miss things. And if we don’t move at all, we won’t see things for how beautiful they truly are. (R.M. Drake)
There are a lot of things I think about when I hear the expressions of “Being Here” or “Being Present.” We live in a society that is always on the go. We are bombarded with information 24/7. Facebook, Tumblr, Instagram, and Twitter, plus countless other social media platforms, have made it uniquely possible to keep in touch with friends and family. They also suck us into a vortex where we’re at once both intimately personal and impersonal with the people who we follow or who we allow to follow us.
On any given day that I choose to visit one of these platforms, I can be assured of three things. The first: I will probably laugh at some funny meme one of my friends has posted. We all have, right? There’s some pretty hysterical stuff out there. The second: Someone will probably post something that will make me emotional. It’s not hard to do, really. I am an emotional sort of person, and a Folgers Christmas commercial could make me reach for Kleenex. The third: Unavoidably, someone will post something that will get me hopping mad. Emotional, remember? And not just the sappy type of emotion. And despite this roller coaster of emotion, we go back to it. Not just back, either – we fully immerse ourselves, until we could be sitting at the dinner table with our family while scrolling through Facebook. And even if you aren’t doing it, chances are someone else in the family is. I’ve been out to dinner and witnessed entire families sitting in a restaurant, scrolling through their phone. Maybe it’s not Facebook, but something else – mail, Pinterest, whatever.
These sites are not inherently wrong either. I am always on Tumblr or Pinterest, getting absorbed. But I think it is important to know when to say when.
Being here is nothing new. I think Oprah used to talk about “being present” when she had her show. I never watched it much, but I could hear a few episodes where “being present” was discussed, and I just shrugged it off, thinking, “I am here every day!” But the reality is that as we progress, and as we are being continually bombarded with news, media, and different facets of technology, we never truly are present in our lives. I can say from experience that our family of six only truly enjoyed dinner together as a family when the kids were growing up, and then gaming during the weekends (we play D&D.) But it started that dinner shifted to the living room, where everyone would bring their plates in order to watch television or play video games. I would be online, floating through Pinterest or Tumblr, and we rarely said a word. When someone was talking, an hour or two later my husband would ask about things that were already discussed, and I’d get irritated because he hadn’t heard. I won’t and can’t blame on just him – we were all at fault in our own ways, courtesy of our own distractions.
I’ve managed to change some things, but not everything. I think in time I will be able to – hopefully before the kids finally get out on their own. I am hoping that some of these ideas might help you and your family to be present, too.
Tips to Reconnect
• Disconnect to Reconnect: You don’t have to make any sweeping changes. If you have kids, you are painfully aware at how important the online world is to kids (and even ourselves). Talk with the family. Have a meeting about your desire to reconnect with them, or maybe start off with just dinner, like we did. While you are seated and eating, there are no phones. That means they are not visible or even on the person. You can tailor this to the needs of your family. If a spouse has to be on call but is there for dinner, just have them put it nearby, so they can still hear it. Thirty minutes to an hour is all you need. Talk to one another, find out about the day’s events. You will really be surprised at what kids will divulge over a plate of spaghetti.
• Redefine Multitasking: It may seem that this tip is one that will only serve to make things more difficult for you, but trust me, it’s not. We live in a world where multitasking is a skill that is encouraged and honed, but it is one that will only serve to distract us from what is really important, and that is being present. Instead of thinking of how to accomplish four things at once, stop and think about this single moment. There are situations that make not multitasking difficult, given expectations of work or school, but you need to step back and assess. Scheduling your day is a great way to figure out exactly when you will no longer have to be multitasking. If you limit the time that you multitask to only when working, when you get home, your brain will naturally start to relax. And then in reverse, when you go to work, your body will know it’s time to get things done.
• Be Conscious: When you set out to do anything you have planned, be it work, errands and chores, or relaxing at home, make an effort to focus wholly on what it is you are doing. Not only will this make completing these tasks easier, but you’ll also be more efficient. Being present is about slowing down and being deliberate and focused. It’s not easy, especially when you are accustomed to doing fifteen things at once. I often joke that my brain is like having five thousand tabs open. Twenty-five are not responding, three radio stations are going on in the background, and there’s a hamster doing back flips on YouTube that has me entranced. But you can do it! Maybe not all the time, maybe imperfectly, but the benefit is slowing down and making an effort to see what is going on around you.
Don’t get discouraged! I’m a huge advocate of slow and steady wins the race! Start small, take a pause in your daily life, and listen to what is going on around you. I’ll be giving you more tips as we continue, and also giving you some of the benefits of being present.