Could you just be?

Karen Bradley, Intuitive Guide
2 days ago
5 min read

I woke the other day with nothing in my diary.

A feeling of freedom came, with a tinge of panic

What, no plans?
Nothing on my to-do list?

Well, yes, always, but what if?

What if I let this day unfold?

What if I just allowed myself to just be?

Not catch up on chores, not get things done.

The feeling is unnatural to me,

I suddenly feel like I should achieve something, be productive, get things done.

But why? Who says?

Would it matter if things waited? Just for a day?

So I allow... and just be.

And in this non-doing, something happens.

Time seems slower, I notice the light shining through the window onto a patch of floor. It twinkles, dancing around.

I move slowly, no where to get to. I sit in different places in the house I’ve not sat in before, looking at different parts of rooms from different perspectives.

In not doing I resist filling my time with ‘stuff’

I resist the urge to needlessly scroll on social media and compare my life to others.

I just am - and that is enough.

Guilt enters the party,

"How can I sit here, doing nothing while others are busy, working or doing something important?"

So, I bring in one of the principles of mindfulness: non-judgement and say to myself, "It’s ok, I’d be happy for anyone else who had a day to ‘just be’ as they will be for me."

When you begin to think about taking time out to ‘just be’ you may have many things that run through your mind:

I don’t have time
I have so much to be doing
It feels uncomfortable to do nothing
What will people around me think?
How do I ‘just be'?

Firstly, the to-do list will always wait and always been there. You could try taking your list and breaking it down into: 'needs attention', 'can wait a while', and 'probably won’t happen'. Then just pay attention to the ‘needs attention’ list over the period of a week, month, whatever suits. But, just for five minutes, an hour, a day, could you just pop that list on hold?

"I don’t have time" often means you are even more in need of taking some time out to ‘just be’

There is a Zen Proverb that says, "You should sit in meditation for twenty minutes every day, unless you’re too busy. Then you should sit for an hour."

Often when we are buzzing around doing lots of things, means we aren’t actually doing any of them well, or with purpose, or being present. Slowing down and taking time out to ‘just be’ doesn’t mean you don’t get things done. On the contrary it means that when you do things from a place of intentionally doing, it comes out of being and there's a greater wisdom and a more considered reaction to whatever arises.

Forget what others think about you taking time to just be. Like my inner critic, who I quietened down, we can bring the compassion we would show others to our own thoughts.

Know that rest is medicine. Doing nothing is necessary for our frazzled minds, and just being is the exact antidote to overwhelm.

The hardest question is: ‘how do I just be?’

Just being is not to be underestimated in how challenging it is, or how beneficial.

When we take time to just be, sitting in stillness, the thoughts or feelings we try hard to push aside can begin to surface. Obviously, this can be uncomfortable. But unless we keep on trying to suppress the uncomfortable (which is hard to do on any kind of permanent basis), they often come out in unhelpful ways at other times. An angry remark, shutting down with discomfort or ‘putting on a brave face’

So, to 'just be' takes courage. And then, one by one, as each feeling or thought comes along, you can experience it, feel it, giving it the time and space it deserves. This is also what we do during EFT. By paying attention, on purpose, to the emotion it feels ‘seen’ and has less of a hold over us.

What does 'just being' look like?

Practical tips on how to ‘just be':

Sit in stillness, in nature preferably, opening all your senses to what you can see, feel, hear, smell or taste.
Take your attention to one thing, for example paying attention to your breath, where it is in your body and noticing the gentle in and out of each breath.
Drop any expectations: how you think you should sit, breathe, do the ‘being.’
There is no right or wrong, good or bad when just being.
Remember it’s a practice. Be kind to yourself. Congratulate yourself on trying, even if you just manage a minute, it’s something to build on.
When uncomfortable feelings come up, try to sit with them, feel them and let them move through you.
Just be, one thought, feeling, breath at a time.

In a world where productivity and our achievements are a measure of success, could you look at just being for a while as an achievement? Reframe rest as success and remember that we are human beings not human doings.

When we stop doing all the time and start being, this act of self-care can have a profound healing effect on our nervous systems. This act of non-striving all the time can help symptoms of stress, anxiety and depression, allowing us to tune into our bodies and emotions and live a more mindful existence.

So, I invite you to try it. Could you just be, one thought, feeling, breath at a time? Moment to moment awareness, without judgment?

Go gently,