I Ate a Puzzle Piece: Lessons in Mindfulness for Beginners
One day I ate a puzzle piece I thought was a Triscuit. Also, let’s talk about mindfulness.
A group of friends and I were staying at a cabin in the mountains one winter. Large windows let the beautiful sunshine stream in. Outside we could glimpse snowcapped mountaintops, evergreen trees, and a bright blue sky. I was donning cozy clothes and doing one of my favorite wintertime activities: puzzling. Yes, putting together a jigsaw puzzle thrills me as a delight, a treat, a pastime that I could do all day and sometimes need to set personal limits around.
We were puzzling, chatting, and snacking. I grabbed a "Triscuit" and slipped it in my mouth. I soon discovered, via the cardboard taste, that I had made a mistake and accidentally put a puzzle piece in my mouth. Don’t worry: I spit it out, cleaned it up, and yes, the puzzle could still be completed.
But the memory lives as a “huh” example of life on autopilot.
Alone With Our Thoughts
I’ve been on a reading kick about the fascinating ways our brains work. In The First Rule of Mastery: Stop Worrying About What People Think of You, Michael Gervais shares insights about our inner world from his work with elite athletes. One research study he shared stopped me in my tracks - puzzle piece halfway to my mouth, if you will.
A 2014 series of studies by researchers from the University of Virginia and Harvard University asked people to sit in a room for six to fifteen minutes, entertaining themselves with only their thoughts. About half reported not enjoying the experience. Then the researchers offered participants the opportunity to give themselves an electric shock, and 67% of men and 25% of women chose to inflict it on themselves rather than just sit there quietly and think.
“What is striking,” the investigators write, “is that simply being alone with their own thoughts for 15 minutes was apparently so aversive that it drove many participants to self-administer an electric shock that they had earlier said they would pay to avoid.”
A Dance with Avoidance (My Always-Available Dance Partner)
In my daily life, I’m not often forced to be with my own thoughts without the opportunity for distraction. Distraction surrounds us. I used to look forward to flights because that was the one time we could be disconnected from the internet. Yet now that’s not the case anymore either.
If I am forced to wait at school pickup, the grocery store line, the dentist’s office, or other human tasks, I can just check my email or do the NYTimes Spelling Bee game.
If I do not force myself, I will not be alone with my thoughts.
What am I running from in there? Is it that bad?
If you’re familiar with the Enneagram, Types 5, 7, and 9 are especially prone to running away from what’s going on in our mind or feeling hard feelings. I’m a Type Nine and that’s my jam: avoidance! [Note to self: create a line of Enneagram jams and call it Ennea-jam]
Another research whopper in Michael Gervais’ book: our brains are always switched on - even when we think they are resting. The mind wanders, and when it does, it tends to wander to self-criticism or worry. A Harvard study showed that we spend nearly 47% of our waking hours in a mind-wandering state. This unhappily wandering state ruminates on the past or catastrophizes about the future. Almost half of our time is spent thinking about things other than what we are doing.
So when my brain wanders from “wow, what a delicious apple I’m eating” to “what did she mean by that comment on my presentation?” or “did I pronounce his name wrong this morning?” I’m normal. Good news though: this is only almost half of our lives spent this way. Glass half full, eh?
No wonder people were hitting the shock button. No wonder distraction feels so tempting.
The news is sometimes hard (understatement of the day). And life is sometimes hard. So of course I reach for distractions (puzzles or otherwise) - anything to stay busy and avoid thinking about heavy things.
“Staring Out the Window” Time
I love traveling for many reasons, but one of them is the “staring out the window” time. This is forced solitude. Forced get-into-your-head time. Even when I fight it, after I let my mind wander a bit, come back to the problem at hand, rework it a little, that’s when I find some of my greatest clarity. Ironically, it’s when I’m not working too hard at it.
Turns out research supports my experience, as long as nature is what’s out the window: gazing at nature makes you more productive.
I’ve heard others note that their greatest ideas come when they are in the shower, where they are alone with their thoughts.
I’ve known people who do a one-minute sit to still their minds and ground their bodies before starting work each day.
I tried to sneak in “mindfulness practices” without you knowing. Did it work? Maybe mindfulness for beginners is less intimidating when we don’t call it mindfulness.
There are many other examples of exercises to try. The trick isn’t to stop our mind from wandering - it’s to notice where it goes and gently steer it somewhere more helpful. Mindfulness can give us more awareness of our thoughts and help us recognize that we are not our thoughts. And thoughts and feelings are not facts.
This is the part where I remind us that we live in a world of distractions and I remember that I willingly go along to be distracted. Take me away, attention economy! All of this is easier said than done.
But what if I could craft more moments of “window time” in my day-to-day?
A one-minute meditation (I know, eww).
A ten-minute walk with no headphones in.
A ten-hour flight to Paris (s’il vous plait). I can dream.
What’s possible if I can take up one or two moments of “window time,” put down my proverbial Triscuits, and let my thoughts settle? I usually find something I didn’t expect. And I won’t have to shock myself.
Small goals. Big insights.
What might you notice if you gave yourself one minute of “window time” today?
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