Giving from a Deep Well

Spend the Afternoon (Hint: You Can't Take It with You) - Annie Dillard


We live about two blocks from a lovely lake in southern Minnesota. At one end is a sandy beach complete with playground and picnic shelters. At the other is a hill that magically transforms into the neighborhood ski slope come winter. In between, is a small dock which I’m sharing today with a couple of silent fishermen. (That's my view in the photo.) In a few months, the lake will be frozen and those same fishermen will be huddled over holes cut into the ice, but today, it is 82 degrees and mostly sunny, a rarity in this mild summer we’ve just had. An afternoon to be savored.

But there is work to do! After all, it’s Monday and the workweek began bright and early. There are blogs to write, website maintenance to be done, our first MN Party with a Purpose happening tomorrow. But the lake was calling, murmuring my name clearly, so today’s blog post is being brought to you from the shores of Crystal Lake because, quite frankly, I needed a productivity boost. Today, I am practicing what I preach.

The Chicks with Checks motto is “Do good….have FUN!” for a whole bunch of very good reasons that can be summed up easily: when we are depleted, we have nothing to give, and having fun is a big part of filling ourselves up.

When our financial coffers get low, we know what to do, and we take action quickly and decisively. We get a better job or add a second one. We spend less. We weigh our spending decisions more carefully. But when our life coffers get low, we make excuses, blaming work or busy-ness, and just keep pushing on doing the same old stuff until we are exhausted and….depleted.

At Google, goofing off is built into the job description. Employees are instructed to spend 20% of their work time doing something completely non-work-related whether it is playing, napping, or just zoning out. As crazy as that sounds, there is method to Google’s madness. A list of studies longer than your arm have clearly shown that taking time out can jump start your concentration, problem solving, productivity, and creativity when you return from your mini-break. In fact, Gmail and Google News are direct results of this free-time policy.

America has become the No-Vacation Nation. We are getting fewer and fewer days off which has far more ominous implications than less time spent at the beach. This completely out-of-whack work-life imbalance negatively affects our health, our relationships, our well-being, even our productivity, and the costs are escalating faster than the national deficit.

Even if you love your work, it’s still work and chances are your paycheck is tied to doing it well. So you work longer and harder. And home isn’t safe either. That Honey-Do list just gets longer and longer whether or not you are sharing the load with a honey. So we push pleasure to the back burner with excuses like “when I have enough time, money, fill in the blank.” Bad move. A relentless focus on staying busy is guaranteed to backfire. Instead, we get diminishing returns that can only diminish us. Working harder and longer can really work against you.

But before we point a finger at the evil corporate empire, we might want to take a look in the mirror. The real obstacle in the way of taking more frequent breaks is our own mistaken notion about the role of down time in our over-scheduled days. How can we justify being idle when there are so many things we “should” be doing? Pay attention, boys and girls, because the key to getting through all those “shoulds” and wringing more from our über busy day might be a healthy dose of leisure.

I tend to get my best ideas while in the shower or taking a walk or driving. (If you see me on the road with a notebook propped against the steering wheel, you might want to get out of the way. Just a thought.) The reason is simple: I’m not trying. My brain is roaming free, skipping around like a little kid, free-wheeling and free-associating. Slogging along trying to force an ah-ha moment just makes me frustrated and stressed and I end up blocking my own creativity.

Which brings us back to the lake. I wanted to write today, honest. But it’s Monday and my energy needed a little boost. So the laptop and I took a wee walk, enjoying the last flowers of summer and the leaves that are beginning to turn. And guess what? While watching the fish glide silently under the dock and the ducks glide not so silently across the surface, inspiration struck and the words flowed effortlessly.

Pulitzer prize-winning author Annie Dillard says “Spend the afternoon. You can’t take it with you.” Good advice. Because how we spend our days is how we make up the days of our lives. If you want to give from a deep well, replenish it often.

Lesson over. Go play. That’s an order!