The Beauty Of Doing Nothing

By: Heather Blanchard

The long, lazy, hazy days of summer are just around the corner, and it seems this season beckons us to slow down a little more and take it easy. ‘Tis a time to filled with vacations, concerts, festivals, swimming and barbecues ~ when we give ourselves a bit more permission to do nothing at all. Whether that’s sitting poolside under an umbrella, watching the tide roll in or watching sunsets at the end of the day ~ and that’s a beautiful thing.

There’s an Italian saying that translates to the sweetness of doing nothing.

“Dolce Far Niente”

This is the pleasure one gets from being idle. Unfortunately, we tend to associate doing nothing with laziness. In fact, in a recent survey from the Wall Street Journal, when given a list of top values like Self-Fulfillment, Marriage, Faith, Tolerance For Others and Patriotism, Hard Work was largely the number one value amongst people across the country. But idle time is actually good for us! After all, some of our best “aha” moments bubble up when we have time to rest. That’s what weekends and vacations are for – and we need more of them! Perhaps we should embrace more siestas and idle time.

In a recent excerpt on CBS Sunday Morning called Take It Easy, economics professor Lani Golden (Penn State Abbington) stated doing nothing gets a bad rap here because we’re always striving to be more productive, to achieve more and have more. We tend to try to multi-task to fit more into our days, but neurological studies actually show it’s almost impossible to multi-task as we can only hold 1-2 thoughts in our brain at a time. In fact, multi-tasking often slows us down! So it seems the best prescription for thinking clearly and being more productive is to pause and take it easy. I have a dear friend with a beach house, & in her kitchen is the following sign:

Take time to coast, make waves, seas opportunity. Avoid pier pressure, harbor strength, come out of your shell. Sea life’s beauty, don’t get tide down & go with the flow.

So give yourself a break and kick back a little more. “Dolce Far Niente.”

XOXO, Heather