Last week my phone died and I paid a visit to – deep breath – the Apple store to have an over-pierced kid sort out my life.
After diagnosing my issue, The Kid (Him: “In my former life I was a piercing technician.” Me: “But you’re 21, you don’t have a former life!”) had to disappear with my phone for 15 minutes (which turned into an hour). So I was left to sit in the store for some excruciatingly empty time.
Normally in such empty moments I would pull out my phone and e-fiddle – check mail, scroll Instagram, return text messages etc. But I clearly couldn’t on this occasion. So I just sat and did nothing. It was great, if painful.
I realized anxiety came up straight away. I broke it down further.
I realised I was anxious because I felt I should be getting on with things and not wasting time just sitting. Letting my mind wander off feels so indulgent. I’ll come back to this in a moment…
But I broke it down further. I realised the bigger part of my anxiety was attributable to a fear of being still with my thoughts and not having a “blunting” agent to distract me away from my worries.
Then, because I had the time (The Kid was still not back), I broke it down again. Thoughts are like banked up bubbles. The big ones – our problems, our worries, our sadness, our loneliness – burst forth first when we allow an opening, ahead of the more banal, medium-sized bubbles. And, so, we don’t like it when we do find ourselves still because we know the sadness and