Taking Time To Be Contemplative?

At first glance, this may seem like a tall order. Me, take time to be contemplative? Can’t…there’s just too many things to DO!

This is what I hear constantly in my practice from folks who are wrestling with tough life issues, and I too am not immune from getting swept up in the “stay active, be productive” mentality. But why is developing a certain level of being contemplative so important for our lives, and why do we have such a hard time permitting it?

First off, most of us reading this post who are Americans have grown up with believing that staying active and being productive – ”in motion” – is good and that passivity; i.e., taking time off for reflection –  is not all that important. If you don’t believe me, check out the national data on how many employees don’t use all their vacation time/personal time each year. I don’t think that people are necessarily choosing to stay at work longer than necessary; it’s more like folks tend to underestimate the value of taking time off. My bet is this attitude is built into our culture. And the bottom line is that our culture doesn’t encourage being contemplative all that much.

Simply put, the value of contemplation is that it promotes integration of new thoughts, feelings, and information into our existing understandings. Like a computer entering a “wait state” to do complex calculations or process a big video file, we too need to shift into a time of reflection and introspection in order to digest inputs. Generally speaking, I see it like this:

• experience
• contemplation
• consideration and reflection
• integration

We simply need “time off” to process life’s inputs. Spiritually speaking, that’s what church time is for; you take a few hours and sit with yourself, thinking about your life, where you’ve been over the week, where you’re going, how you’ve felt during the week, thinking about your loved ones and their welfare, and talking and listening to your Creator and thinking about His effect upon your life, your personal pathway down life’s road.

Why is it so tough sometimes to slow down and sit with yourself in contemplation? Because then we have to truly face ourselves, and that can be unsettling. Where are we going, really? Letting ourselves feel the inevitable uncertainties of life is not easy; most folks would rather have a task to work on than sit and consider where they’re going in life.

Try a little experiment this week – take an hour and sit with a cup of coffee. Look out the window and think about all the places you’ve been in the last few days. Ask yourself what’s been significant about your life experiences. Ask yourself “where am I going?” You’ll probably notice that the first 15 minutes are hard to tolerate; you’ll feel restless and want to get up and move. If you resist the urge, you’ll probably find yourself settling into a more contemplative state for the next half-hour or so. Here’s the formula: you’ve got to get there to be there.

Good luck! See where it takes you. You may find it interesting!