Welcome to Issue 59 of Writing and Other Stuff, a newsletter by me, Kim Scaravelli, with a focus on writing with flair, flexing your creative muscles, and building a strong brand voice. Thanks for reading! If a friend forwarded this email to you, say thank you - and subscribe here.
I'm a mental time traveller.
I can slide effortlessly between ruminating about the past and stressing about the future.
In fact, it's so effortless that I sometimes struggle to stay anchored in the present.
๐ฆ I don't think I'm a unicorn when it comes to this capacity. I suspect that many of us spend as much (or more) time pondering yesterday and tomorrow as we do observing what's happening right now.
This can be a big problem, because creativity and productivity live in REAL TIME moments. When you're observing and feeling things as they happen, you're at your best!
Cool quote
โMindfulness gives you time. Time gives you choices. Choices, skillfully made, lead to freedom.โ
Bhante H. Gunaratana
โ๏ธ How I anchor my mind
It's super easy for me to wander off-track. Seriously! It's a daily issue.
When I feel myself paddling into the murkiness of past problems, or drifting into the Sea of Ifs, Ands, and Buts, I drop anchor in the PRESENT by doing a quick 5-Senses Check:
SEE | SMELL | HEAR | TOUCH | TASTE
- Examine an object and really think about what it looks like.
- Inhale deeply and define what you smell.
- Identify 1-3 distinctive sounds. If there's just silence, MAKE some noise!
- Touch a surface or an item and acknowledge what it feels like.
- And if possible, savour the taste of something. Whatever you have available will do. I keep a variety of hard candies in my office drawer for emergencies when I've got nothing nearby to taste.
This doesn't need to be a time-consuming exercise. For example, I just had my day interrupted by an agitated phone call from one of my children. It threw me off, so I dropped anchor:
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I examined the cover of a notebook on my desk. (Noticed that the flowers are actually the bodies of pink flamingos. It's wild that I never noticed that before!)...
Inhaled deeply and enjoyed the lingering scent of the cranberry-basil candle I burned yesterday afternoon. ๐Lovely...
Smiled at an impressive volume of chirping by an extremely small bird in a tree outside my office. The window is closed and my heat pump is on, but this creature has the vocal power of Beyonce...
Ran my hands over my pant legs and realized that they're getting a bit nubby...
Took a sip of my lukewarm coffee and wished it was still hot.
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This whole experience took less than a minute, but it did the trick. Instead of fuming about that annoying phone call, my mind is back in the HERE AND NOW.
๐ I'm finishing my newsletter - and drinking the last of my lukewarm coffee.
Stuff Worth Sharing!
โ๏ธFound an interesting article in Psychology Today about How to Use Your 5 Senses to Stimulate Creative Flow.
โ๏ธAnd on a somewhat off-topic note, I had to figure out more about the Beyonce bird in my yard. Yes. This is now her official name. Went hunting online and discovered a fascinating page by the British Natural History Museum: Birdsong identification for beginners: 20 common songs and calls.โ
For the Word Nerds
There's a languid, lazy pace to late July and August - at least where I live.
Whether you lean into it, or fight it, everything seems to slow down. Meetings get postponed, projects move to the back burner, and business communications, like email, become A LOT less speedy.
We all feel it, but in Canada, we don't have a word for it. Luckily, the Germans came up with the term SOMMERLOCH.
Sommerloch (pronounced "summer-lock") can be translated into "summer hole". It's used to describe the slow season of mid-to-late summer when everyone in Germany goes on vacation, many shops are closed, and the pace of life slows down.
Whether you're the person postponing meetings - or the person struggling to get meetings scheduled - it's nice to have a word for what's happening.
๐ We've all just fallen into the summer hole.
Thanks for reading. I'll see you again August 7th. In the meantime, if you like my newsletter, here are 3 easy-peasy ways to show your support. Pick your favourite now, before you forget!
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