My day starts slowly. A cup of coffee, a quick YouTube video, and I’m off to work. It’s not a long commute to my office in the other room, but by the time I’ve sat down my mind is already buzzing with a long list of tasks. Distractions like unfinished chores leftover from the week and new work for today. I find it hard to lock in on tasks I’m not personally interested in, or to stay focused for long bits of time. I tend to flutter between busywork until I find a single task to focus on, at which point I can stay targeted on that task for hours. I get my work done, but I wish I could still accomplish more.
I scarf down my dinners. Dieting habits aside, I’ve developed a propensity for being a fast eater. My fiancé tells me to slow down, but that never made much sense to me. Why slow down when I can finish it this fast? It never clicked until last night when I was drinking a protein shake. After finishing it in two gulps, she looked at me in loving horror and commented on how I could not have enjoyed that. I was confused. Of course, I enjoyed it. I drank it didn’t I? I thought it tasted great! But on later reflection, I realized what she meant. I hadn’t taken the time to process the drink. Instead of savoring it, remembering its flavor, and enjoying it, I had consumed it. I had missed the broader point of the drink by leaning too hard on what it could do for me functionally—fill me up and taste good.
If you asked me to describe the drink to you, I could say it was chocolaty, but not much more. I can’t remember the texture or viscosity. It is a faded and soon to be forgotten memory because I didn’t take the time to properly catalogue and enjoy it.
I’m going to work on treating more of my life like a chocolate protein shake. To be savored and understood, not to be rushed through. Like with books. I always have trouble remembering the names of characters in books. It doesn’t matter if I’ve just looked from the page. Their names stay down with the ink. Maybe, if I read books a little slower and with more care, I wouldn’t struggle to remember the cast of my stories? Simply, I’m so enamored with the concept of done, that I’ve sacrificed the art of doing.