I haven’t sat around doing nothing, and by nothing I really mean nothing, for I cannot remember when. No watching of the tv or a film. No Reading. No searching Facebook’s home page for the latest gossip. No emailing, talking on the phone or texting. I am simply lying in the stillness of nothingness.

My mind gently wonders about. Sometimes I find myself caught in boredom and the discomfort of “doing” nothing. The urge to find entertainment beckons. I decide to feel the discomfort, move into it and be. Suddenly the boredom goes away and I find an unusual comfort in the stillness again. I say unusual, because perhaps it is unfamiliar or long forgotten. The days of doing nothing and being in the suspension of that space seems historical. A thought of “Oh yeah, life was once that way” which might as well be filed away with grandfathers “I remember when a pack of gum was a nickel in my day”.

Sometimes my mind gets caught with intrigue over past memories and future thoughts. They lazily dance between scenes and scenarios, a silent film in my minds projection.

“It’s kind of nice doing nothing” he says to me, in a moment where boredom’s reach has found the back of my neck. “Yeah it is quite nice” my inner chatter responds. There is an odd deliciousness to it like a new flavor you are contemplating.

The sounds of the room take shape composing the notes that make up their day. The figures on the mantle seem, in their stillness, to have the greatest story. My mind delves in and listens. My state goes from drawing back in observation to melting in, into this middle world of stillness in motion. I relax. I warm to the moment and allow my gaze to sweep over the photo on the wall for the dozenth time, each time finding a new story within it.

How rarely we do this, I think. The art of doing nothing, of just being, without reaching for something better or pushing away what we imagine we do not want. Slow down, slow down. My pen no longer knows which way to go. The pages don’t need to be filled. Somehow when they are empty they are so much more full. How ironic that is, I think. We fill our lives with busy moments to give more meaning to what is in fact meaningless. We are full, we are stuffed. Another button needs undoing to loosen the waist, the waist of “wasting” time filling time.

So how about we digest, take a moments rest and let be. I return to me, and my imaginations eye, wondering through as time more slowly passes by.