I often talk about taking very short breaks during the day of a minute or so to recharge and avoid accumulating stress and tensions.  Today, I would like to recommend another type of break during the day, something longer, a bit different, that I would like to call deep pausing or contemplative break.

Of course, you can have all sorts of breaks during the day, as long as you take some! I particularly recommend a proper lunch break for instance, away from the computer screen and more than a sandwich gulped down in 5 minutes.

But a break that would be just that: a pause, a moment to do nothing… this is a bit more unusual in our very busy lives, in a society where each moment we are not doing something is often considered not productive and therefore worthless.

This deep pausing can be done at any moment during the day. Choose what works best for you. If you manage to make it a ritual, ie to do it everyday at the same time, all the better because you will find it easier to stick to it.  It could be in the morning before you start working or right after lunch or at the end of your working day.  It depends on your schedule, your organisation, where you live.

I suggest you take at least 10 minutes for this, more if you can.  Ideally in nature, a park or even a garden can suffice.  This break will be easier and more efficient in less time in nature.  The idea is to disconnect from your day and reconnect to your inner rhythm, far away from the outside frenzy of the world.  Go for a gentle walk or sit down on a bench or anywhere you want in nature, with no music, no podcast, your phone on flight mode.  Keep your eyes open, let the ideas that are going round in your head melt away as you breathe, admire, contemplate what is around you.  If ideas come and go that bring you back to work or tasks you have to do, bring your attention back to your surroundings.  Be inspired by the calm of nature, slow down, go back to what is essential: your own rhythms, how you are feeling, what is coming from deep inside you and not from the world spinning around like mad.

A landscape, nature are the perfect places for this contemplative break, but you can also use other surroundings depending on where you are and what you like. It could be contemplating a log fire, a painting in a museum, an inspiring image in a book…

What will your deep pausing be like?