Reclaiming the Natural Rhythms of Life

For much of my working life, productivity had a very specific shape. It meant sitting at a desk, first in front of a typewriter and later in front of a computer, moving from one task to the next and accomplishing something I could point to at the end of the day. Somewhere along the way, I became so accustomed to that way of working that I think I lost touch with some of the more natural rhythms of life.

For years, I spent my days in front of a screen. In the last several years of my working career, I was creating social media content, moving from platform to platform throughout the day. In between, I checked email, researched articles, wrote content, created graphics, and handled the other online tasks that came with the work.

There was always something else to do.

And because there was always something to do, I learned to associate sitting at a computer with accomplishing something.

The habit stayed with me.

Even now, when there often isn’t any particular reason for me to be on the computer, I sometimes find myself sitting down and looking for something to do. Checking something. Researching something. Organizing something. Creating something.

Not because it needs to be done.

Simply because being at the computer makes me feel productive.

And recently, it dawned on me that this is a habit I may need to gently let go of.

When Productivity Has a Particular Look

We’ve been talking about productivity lately and the ways we can begin to look at it differently. But I’ve realized that productivity isn’t only about how much we expect ourselves to accomplish.

Sometimes, we’ve become conditioned to believe that productivity has to look a certain way.

• Perhaps it means sitting at a desk and working.
• Perhaps it means earning money.
• Perhaps it means completing tasks that can be checked off a list.
• Perhaps it means creating something we can point to at the end of the day and say, There. I did that.

The things we do at home can feel strangely different.

Reading a book doesn’t always seem productive.

Preparing a meal doesn’t always seem productive.

Folding laundry, watering the garden, washing dishes, sitting outside with a cup of tea, mending something, or simply resting can somehow feel like the things we do instead of accomplishing something.

But who decided that?

When did the ordinary work of caring for ourselves, our homes, and the people we love become separate from our “real” lives?

The Productivity Habit Can Outlive the Work

Many of us have spent decades working according to someone else’s schedule.

We got up because the alarm went off. We went where we were supposed to go. We worked during the hours we were expected to work. We organized our days around deadlines, responsibilities, meetings, appointments, and the tasks we needed to complete before we could go home.

And then we came home and tried to fit the rest of life into whatever time remained.

Those habits can become deeply ingrained.

Even when the job changes … or disappears altogether … we may still feel that familiar pull to justify our time. We can find ourselves looking for something productive to do simply because sitting still feels uncomfortable.

We may no longer have a boss asking what we accomplished today.

But somewhere along the way, we may have become our own boss.

I don’t think we always notice it.

We simply feel restless.

We wander through the house looking for something to do. We sit down at the computer. We pick up the phone. We start another project. We make another list.

Anything to feel as though the day has counted for something.

But Life Has Its Own Rhythms

The natural rhythms of life aren’t particularly concerned with efficiency.

Bread takes the time it takes to rise.

A garden grows in its season.

A pot of soup simmers slowly on the stove.

Laundry gets washed, dried, folded, put away, and eventually washed again.

Meals are prepared, eaten, and cleaned up after. Floors need sweeping again. Dishes reappear in the sink. Plants need tending. We get tired and need to rest.

Much of ordinary life is repetitive.

Much of it is not measurable.

And much of it doesn’t produce anything that can be neatly displayed at the end of the day.

But that doesn’t make it meaningless.

Perhaps this is one of the things we’ve lost touch with. We have become so accustomed to thinking in terms of output that we forget there is value in simply participating in our own lives.

• There is value in preparing food.
• There is value in creating a comfortable home.
• There is value in caring for the things we already have.
• There is value in learning something simply because we are interested.
• There is value in sitting quietly.
• There is value in rest.

Coming Home to Our Own Lives

I don’t mean that we should never be productive. There are things that need to be done. Work matters. Responsibilities matter. Creating and accomplishing things can be deeply satisfying.

But perhaps productivity was never meant to be the measure of a good day.

Perhaps a good day can include work and rest.

Doing and being.

Accomplishing something and simply enjoying something.

Maybe reclaiming a more natural rhythm of life means learning to recognize that not every worthwhile thing produces a visible result.

I can spend an hour on the computer and have something to show for it.

Or I can spend an hour reading a book, drinking my tea, and giving my mind a chance to settle.

Both hours belong to my life.

Neither one needs to justify the other.

This is something I am still learning.

After years of sitting at a desk and moving from one task to the next, there is still a part of me that believes I should be doing something whenever I have free time. But I’m beginning to wonder if the question itself is sometimes the problem.

Instead of asking, What should I be doing right now?

Perhaps I can ask, What does this moment need?

Sometimes the answer will be work.

Sometimes it will be laundry or dinner or tending the garden.

And sometimes, perhaps, the answer will simply be nothing at all.

Learning to Let Life Be Enough

There is a certain freedom in realizing that our homes are not merely the places we return to after our important lives have happened somewhere else.

Home is part of life.

The meal being prepared is part of life.

The book being read is part of life.

The garden, the laundry, the quiet morning, the afternoon rest, the conversation at the kitchen table … these things are not empty spaces between more important accomplishments.

They are our lives.

And perhaps reclaiming the natural rhythms of life begins there.

By noticing where we have learned to rush.

By recognizing the habits that no longer serve us.

By allowing ourselves to step away from the constant need to produce.

By remembering that a meaningful life is not built only from the things we accomplish.

Sometimes, the most important thing we can do is stop trying so hard to make the moment productive and simply allow ourselves to live it.

Maybe that is part of coming home.

Not just coming home to a house.

But coming home to our own lives.