Give a break
As soon as I am out of bed in the morning, half asleep, brushing my teeth and the days events unfold in my head. I have to send that mail. Before that I have to complete that last piece of code and test it. The code fragment appears in my head hazily. My father wanted to book train tickets. I will teach him to do it this time. That way he is on his own. That tax thing has to be paid. Tomorrow is the last day. What will I listen to on Youtube while I am driving? Oh, my car has to be cleaned. It is so dirty. That reminds me, emission test has not been done for months. I regularly see traffic cops waiting in that corner.
Running with a checklist makes you worse than a machine. Doing a checklist and working off of it is fine. But what makes you miserable is the habit of running with a hammer in hand when everything begins to look like a nail. You need to learn to be without the hammer and wield it only when you absolutely identify a nail. If you give yourself breaks, you can pause and think what is important or how to do something in a minimalistic way. The mind and its ego will always look for things that can add a feather to its ego cap. ‘You see, I had to do so much today’, that bragging it needs on a facebook or over the phone.
After ticking off that first item in the checklist, do not go to task number two. Just allow yourself some time. Talk to someone nearby. Crack a joke if you are not that serious type. It will help you and help him. Go out of the building and look around. Take a whiff of fresh air outside (which is becoming a rare commodity). Do something that has nothing to do with your list. Simply sit if you have nothing and practice remaining that way. Do not go and read two pages in a novel and go to facebook to say ‘How I read a book in between a hectic schedule’. Your manager or whomever you have to get your pay check may be calling you. Politely tell him that you will call back and continue to stare at the sky.
The more you start to do this, the more you will begin to live this life. You may begin to sow the seed of spreading happiness.
