
11 May You don’t do aware. You be aware (MO GAWDAT)
Living demands that we alternate between the states of being and doing. Some of us spend more in one than the other. Most of us do more than be. It’s what the modern world expects of us. We wake up every morning and rush through a life that is totally engaged in doing. This fast-paced, immersive lifestyle is the opposite of our default nature as humans.
All that doing and thinking of modern life leaves no space to let awareness in. By removing the clutter, we become present, pay attention, and start to receive.
You don’t do aware. You be aware.
As you do, you’ll find it fascinating to realize that often, doing is not the only way to achieve progress and results. Sometimes you can get ahead just by being—a concept that is at extreme odds with modern Western culture.
The Taoist tradition captures this in a concept called wu wei, which translates as “nondoing.” A metaphor often cited in this philosophy relates to farming. If your intention is to grow a plant, do what you should do. Give it sunlight, fertilizer, and water. Having done that, begin the nondoing by leaving the plant alone to grow on its own. Once the conditions for growing the plant are fulfilled, more doing results in more harm than good. The wise farmer knows that the best possible progress is achieved by inaction. Doing nothing is the best thing to do.
It all starts with making awareness your priority. Be crazy about finding out everything happening around you and inside you. Be curious. Be an explorer. Be a fanatic.
Set out every morning with your brain primed to be open to something new. As you go through your day tomorrow, try to find out how many different types of trees you come across. For the rest of the week, measure the time your commute takes along different routes. Pay attention to how you treat other people. Notice if you treat your boss at work differently than the people you manage. Monitor your daily water consumption or your posture while you sit. It doesn’t matter what you set out to notice, just give yourself a reason to be alert. When you get back home, try to remember as much of your day as you can. If you seem to have forgotten part of the day, spend time trying to remember what happened.
Start a “positive events journal.” Stay alert all day looking for the good parts. Write them down. As soon you make them your target, they’ll start popping up all over your day, making it a positive, happy day.
When you feel that you’re starting to get the hang of it, give yourself the ultimate challenge and monitor the times when you’re not aware (because those are events that you should be aware of too). Train yourself to look for the moments when your mind wanders outside the present. You don’t have to do anything about it. Just notice and say, “Whoops, my mind slipped for a minute there.” The simple act of noticing it will snap you back into the present.
Solve for Happy
Mo Gawdat