Non doing

Never have I experienced such true ‘non-doing’ as I have since being a mother.
In recent times life has gotten so incredibly busy, think of when you see a friend you haven’t caught up with in a while and what do most of us say when asked how we are and what we’ve been doing? “I’ve been really busy…..” We say it like its a good thing, wear it as a badge of honour knowing our lives are worthwhile when they are full, even if they are full of menial tasks and we are feeling less than. When we do have some time to ourselves we tend to get on social media, surf the net or check our emails. I see some kids even staring at a screen while in their prams going for a walk? Whatever happened to day dreaming? To looking at the world around us? This resistance of non-doing is becoming increasingly apparent, and with the next generations it will only get worse. The constant need to fill in our every waking seconds can manifest itself as anxiety, unease and a low level feeling of distress.

When I first had my baby girl and was breast feeding there was a lot of sitting around. She would feed slowly, taking around 90minutes each feed, 5-6 feeds a day, do the math and that’s around 8 hours of enforced non-doing daily, and gradually I went crazy! I suffered greatly from post natal depression, constant anxiety and felt fearful every minute of every day. Thinking back I equate some of this to my need of constant ‘doing’. I am not only a very physical person, but also driven to succeed and when I was forced to stop and sit I quite simply couldn’t cope.
Thank goodness I had a yoga and meditation practice which saw me through some of the way, an amazingly supportive husband and family and a great doctor.

Recently my little girl has been sick on and off, as happens to kids, and I have again been forced into non-doing. This time I felt anxiety creeping and I breathed into it. I increased my yoga practice, did early morning pranayama and just went with the flow of being with my beautiful daughter. Sure there were many times when I found myself walking the house looking for something to do, trying to busy myself, but once I became increasingly aware of my need to fill in every moment, and Recognise the strange feeling that would come with realising there was nothing to be done, I could then see it for what it was….a habit.

The practice of ‘non doing’ is one of the main concepts in Taoism, it even has it’s own name, Wu Wei. It is the art of non-action and non-attachment, of letting go of the need to fill in the moments of our lives and instead simply being, in this moment. So next time you find yourself feeling the need to fill up that ‘to do’ list use the mantra Wu Wei, know that it is only your past habits creeping in and simply sit and be.