Something Important About Nothing
The outstanding scientific discovery of the twentieth century is not television, or radio, but rather the complexity of the land organism. Only those who know the most about it can appreciate how little is known about it. The last word in ignorance is the man who says of an animal or plant: ‘What good is it?’ If the land mechanism as a whole is good, then every part is good, whether we understand it or not. If the biota, in the course of aeons, has built something we like but do not understand, then who but a fool would discard seemingly useless parts? To keep every cog and wheel is the first precaution of intelligent tinkering. - Aldo Leopold
I came across this quote in the most recent In Practice issue, which is the journal of Holistic Management International.
This is an important concept to keep in mind as it relates to land management.
If the land mechanism as a whole is good, then every part is good, whether we understand it or not.
There is more to the world than we can perceive.
This is one reason why leaving space for zone 5 is important. We don't know everything. We need to give nature room to do its thing, and this space should probably be far more widely distributed than it currently is.
I'm also thinking about how this concept may apply to our own lives.
I think there is a part of the normal human experience that we have discarded in our modern world - time to do nothing.
This observation comes on the back of a very good day that was spent sitting around with Chesley's grandparents doing nothing in particular.
We cooked, we ate, we played, we read, and we talked. The day flowed without effort, and no one put any pressure on it to be something more than it was.
Something about it felt like a pressure relief valve being let out.
Something important seems to happen when I give myself permission to do nothing. Lately that has been almost never.
I'm not sure how to describe it, but I think this is worth exploring.
My experience suggests we need time to "do nothing". This space where your brain isn't preoccupied with things that need done leads to growth and forward momentum, as counterintuitive as it may seem at first thought.
The time where you aren't telling yourself that you need to get something done allows your brain to sort through things, gain perspective, and put things in order.
It's kind of like when you get a truck stuck in the mud. When you start spinning the tires, the worst thing you can do is punch the gas. If you do, there's a good chance you're going to dig a bigger hole and make it harder to get out.
That's what it feels like I've been doing lately as it relates to work. I've been working so hard that I stopped making any progress. My wheels started spinning, I punched the gas, and I sprayed mud everywhere.
I haven't given myself time off because I tell myself a story that goes something like there is too much important stuff going on right now, now isn't the right time.
This is akin to sitting in the drivers seat and watching your back tires dig into a mud pit and saying that you can't take your foot off the gas because you need to go forward.
Most of my waking time is consumed by one of two things. The first is a schedule of events that I empose on myself that leads to there always being something to do next.
It's hard to be in the moment when you are constantly trying to get something else done.
The second thing that consumes my time is information. This goes back to that idea that information consumes attention that I shared recently.
I've noticed this a lot over the past two days. When I enter a space where I don't have anything to do, I am more prone than usual to getting sucked into consuming information.
That empty space is uncomfortable at first, and I lunge to fill it with something. Often that something is the phone.
If there is something important about doing nothing, then this means that our tendency to grab our phones during any down time is even more destructive than I thought.
What are we giving up by filling our every waking moment with something to do or something to consume?
What could we gain if we gave ourself a bit more space to just be?
Is down time a "seemingly useless part" that we are discarding through unintelligent tinkering?
I think it might be. What do you think?
Life is good.
Reply to: rewildling@proton.me
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