The Benefits of the Pause

Taking pause before I dig

---

​"You know how robins run about eight inches, then stop, cock their heads, and look and listen? If nourishment is there, they find it. My soul offers continual guidance and sustenance if only I will stop and listen often. "
—Parker J. Palmer 

---

There is much to feel anxious about and much to keep us busy–overly busy these days. So many options arise of where to give our attention and energy.  When we lose the ability to pause, hang out in a gap,  or take a conscious breath, we will find ourselves exhausted, discouraged, overwhelmed, or (and) overcommitting .  

A bird can't always be in flight.  Write about that. 

Without such pauses, we cannot listen to ourselves; we will not know how to listen, like the robin, for that sweet nourishment beneath our feet. Even what we most want will elude us because, as research reveals, chronic busyness doesn’t increase our satisfaction but decreases it. 
 
When we pause, we can consider what truly nourishes us and others. 

When we pause, we take a look inside and out—we bring a curious awareness to the moment or the task before us and listen but do nothing. We can choose to pause before we speak, before and during our meals, and while engaged in a creative activity. Rushing oneself or others is an act of aggression. A life without routine pauses is harmful to our well-being. 

In my writing, I take purposeful pauses. I don't go away from the writing to eat something or get distracted in another way. Instead, I stop and pause. Breathe. Be curious about where the writing is taking me and where it might take the reader. 

Natural gaps in our lives provide some pause, like waiting in line, taking a break between tasks, finishing up a meal, or some other activity—those moments when nothing has been planned, randomly occurring times of an opportunity to pause purposefully. 
 
"When was the last time you were bored—truly bored—and didn’t instantly spring to fill your psychic emptiness by checking Facebook or Twitter or Instagram? The last time you stood in line at the store or the boarding gate or the theatre and didn’t reach for your Smartphone seeking deliverance from the dreary prospect of forced idleness?" —Maria Popova, “How We Learn to Be Alone,” brainpickings.org

We may discover discomfort in pauses, often telling us something is wrong. Or the pause may give us space to make a more conscious choice. In my yoga practice, these pauses let me be in the moment of a pose without rushing into the next one. That way, I receive even more benefits. 

Take a pause now.

---

---

---

When I walked down the road
taking only You,
until the noise became less—and the light more
true, then
the river began to flow again
under my skin.  
                                       by Rebecca Cecchini, Her poems can be found throughout my book, THE CLUE of the Red Thread: Discovering Fearlessness and Compassion in Uncertain Times as places to take pause and notice. 

click on cover to purchase book!

---