This is one of those LinkedIn-style tosser posts where I observe something super obvious to everyone.
Whenever I do things like exercise, I usually fill the air with content1.
Podcasts, music, news, programs.
I always saw it as maximizing the time by getting steps or active calories in simultaneous with listening to the latest episodes or tracks.
Recently I’ve been deeply entrenched in a project and some morning laps around the track saw me instead opt for nothing. I left the earbuds behind because I really needed to think through some implementation issues.
And…wow. It’s pretty weird actually being captive to your own thoughts and having no option but to think deeply about things. It was hugely beneficial and in half an hour I made some decisions that I had stewed over for some time. It provided enormous clarity on some projects.
I lost sight of actually thinking somewhere along my journey. The novelty of having content everywhere, effortlessly, became second nature and I would thoughtlessly fill the air with something, anything, at virtually all times.
The last time I used to really have this sort of purposeful quiet time was when I commuted a distance and would drive purposefully in silence. To a lesser extent I also enjoyed it when I would cut the yard on a multi-acre property, back when we made the mistake of moving out to the countryside (which isn’t really awesome when you have multiple young children). Regardless, the lawn tractor was loud so I’d wear ear protection and would just contemplate during the entire cut. It was almost meditative.
Regardless, I’ve rediscovered this, and I am going to strive to purposefully ensure that I actually think about things more during the day.
Did I just invent thinking about things? Maybe!
Footnotes
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Meaning the air between my earbuds and my eardrums, as I’m not a selfish sociopath that forces whatever I’m listening to on unwanted victims. Well…aside from family members occasionally. ↩