3 minute read
It is New Years Eve of 2018 and I’m sitting on a zafu in a dimly light meditation hall. My new home is the Manresa Jesuit Retreat House in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. It was built to help people grow in their spiritual life by offering group & individual retreats. I am just one of many guests who have come through it’s doors and for the next ten-days I will do something even more difficult than the endurance challenges I so willingly throw myself into.
Instead of movement, I will be still. Really, really still. Like, so still I can’t scratch an itch or move my leg when it starts to fall asleep. Like, if this was a sport, I’d be earning my black belt in solitude. For the next ten-days I adhere to “noble silence”. There will be no reading or writing, no phone calls or internet, no exercise or movement. No words spoken and eye-contact made to other guests. Just me & my zafu for 12 hours a day in silence. By myself. With myself.
Why would someone want to do that to themselves?
Because I have been there before – in 2010 rowing solo across the Atlantic – with no follow boat or outside assistance for a total of 70 days alone at sea, I am familiar with what can happen in solitude. What can be labeled as social isolation, also considered the cruelest form of punishment, can be something else. Something greater. Something that can lead to a life filled with more meaning and purpose.
If there is one silver-lining to COVID-19, it would be the opportunity to reconnect with yourself. To make friends with the pause and carry from it lessons into the future. Perhaps now, as we being to re-engage with our world once again with businesses re-opening and travel restrictions being lifted, is the time to look back at how time with yourself is valuable.
Here are some of the benefits I have discovered by spending time with myself:
Room for creative energy & innovation
If anyone says, “I feel bored”, tell them “that is GREAT!” Often times the most creative ideas come after periods of boredom or stagnation. As someone who loves crafting, I usually find I have energy after times of this open space. After-all, it’s much easier to paint on a blank canvas than one that is already full.
Room to be a sponge.
Soak in new books. Soak in interesting podcasts. Soak in thought-provoking documentaries. Be a sponge to the infinite possibilities to learn and expand your knowledge. You can soak it all up, or you can let it all out by writing, setting goals & intentions, reflecting, and listening to that little voice inside that can be hard to hear with so many distraction and so much noise. We might be called to do something but we might not sit still long enough to hear what that voice is saying.
Room for deeper relationships.
Every day we engage in interactions with one another, whether it be at work or simply running errands. When these interactions are no longer automatic, they become more intentional. You have the ability to choose how you invest in your relationships. You can develop even more gratitude for those relationships when unable to freely engage.
Empty space can actually make room to uncover and discover more. One of the greatest lesson I have learned from spending time with myself is recognizing how truly connected we are. Even in the middle of an ocean, thousands of miles away from other human beings, I felt connected when visited by the dolphins, dorados, tea turtles and sharks. Or it could be when seeing an airplane cross the sky above me. Just knowing that every morning we all would be sharing the same sunshine and every night we would be looking at the same stars made me feel connected during one of the most isolating times of my life.
I hope you, too, have appreciated how we are all but a moment and a memory away from those we dearly cherish and love. Nothing can take away from the interconnectedness we all share as fellow human and journeyer’s in this thing called life.
You are truly never alone.
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