Why do we fill every space with busyness?
Have you ever noticed how quickly we fill a quiet moment?
For one, I know this has been a big thing in life. After all, I am the woman who cant even watch a film without doing some online puzzle and editing photos at the same time. I'm not just filling it, I'm overflowing!
A few seconds waiting for the kettle to boil and out comes the phone. A walk becomes an opportunity to listen to a podcast. The television goes on in the background. A spare evening gets filled with jobs, scrolling, messages or another item on the to-do list.
It's curious really.
Many of us say we long for peace and quiet. We want to get away from the noise of the world and find some peace. Yet the minute we have a moment of silence we often rush to fill it. Why?
What lives in the silence?
Perhaps because silence has a habit of revealing things we'd rather not look at. Not dramatic things necessarily, just the thoughts that sit quietly beneath the surface.
I know, from my own experience, that all the noise of life, stresses, worries, thoughts from the past, regrets and doubts creep into the mind without invitation.
In truth they can be uncomfortable, even frightening. Things we don't really need to listen to, but they are there nevertheless, banging on the door of our minds to be heard.
We endlessly replay conversations, have fears about the future, doubt ourselves. Everything coloured by old stories and beliefs. So many of us are simply prone to overthinking.
At the current moment, more than ever, the outside world encroaches on our security, our sense of safety and stability. We just can't get away from it wherever we turn.
And to make things worse, the little voice that likes to remind us of our mistakes while conveniently forgetting all our successes, chatters away in our mind.
We all have one, and frequently it can focus on the negative. Stories about being not good enough, not being loveable enough, not being successful enough, just not being enough. Stories we all carry around with us without even realising.
The details are different for each of us, but I suspect the experience is surprisingly universal.
Most of us spend an extraordinary amount of energy trying not to listen to it.
This may sound just a little bit bonkers but I've given mine a character. He happens to look like a small green gremlin with a purple mohican, who whispers things in my ear, determined to derail me. ( no I don't suffer from schizophrenia ..I'm just creative & like thing to be envisionable!)
He's very fond of whispering things like:
"See? This proves you're not good enough."
For years he won most of the arguments.
Yours may take a different form. The details don't matter.
Where the good things happen
So we fill the space. With work, with relationships, with busyness, with achievement, with television, with scrolling, with endless activity.
Anything that stops us having to sit quietly with ourselves.
Not because we're lazy. Not because we're addicted to our phones. But because busyness can sometimes feel easier than stillness.
Yet over the years I've noticed something interesting. Many of the things people seem to be searching for most desperately cannot be found in the noise. Clarity, creativity, peace, connection, a sense of purpose. They tend to appear when we slow down enough to notice them.
Not because silence magically solves our problems. But because silence gives us a chance to see what is really going on.
No need to solve everything, just to notice
One of the most important lessons I've learnt over time is that the goal isn't to stop the thoughts. The goal is to notice them. To recognise when an old story has been triggered. To realise that just because a thought appears doesn't mean it is true.
And then to choose.
Do we follow it?
Or do we gently let it pass?
That choice sounds simple. Sometimes it isn't. Sometimes the gremlin is extremely convincing.
But awareness changes everything. The moment we notice what is happening, we are no longer trapped inside it. We have options. We have choice. And that choice is what makes us innately human.
Navel gazing
In my thirties I became aware that I was repeating the same patterns over and over again.
I could see them, I knew they were not doing me any good, I just didn't know how to change them. What followed was what I now affectionately call my "navel gazing phase."
I threw myself into self-development with enormous enthusiasm. I read everything from eat Pray Love to the Pursuit of happiness
I trained in counselling, coaching and NLP, CBT. I attended workshops., watched videos.
I decided I needed more so spent four weeks alone on a tiny island in Thailand learning yoga, meditation and herbal medicine. I joined an immersive dance group and found myself dancing to the sunrise & sunset on a mountain in Turkey, eating an absurd amount of lentils and herbal tea. I did some really extreme self development courses.
Looking back, it all feels rather funny. I was so desperately trying to fix myself.
As though somewhere out there was a person holding the answer to becoming happy.
The truth is simple, it just takes awareness.
The irony is that after all those years of searching, the most important lesson turned out to be surprisingly simple.
I wasn't broken. I didn't need fixing. What I needed was awareness.
These days, difficult things still happen.
Neighbours are unkind. The news is upsetting. Someone says something hurtful. A worry appears. A fear gets triggered.
The difference is that now I notice it happening, and over time I've learnt to notice it quicker and quicker.
The trigger still works. My mind still races off in the direction it has always raced. But I'm watching it happen rather than being lost inside it.
I've become aware of the stories. And awareness changes everything.
For me, Nature has become one of the places where that awareness is easiest to find.
Not because I sit cross-legged on a hillside achieving enlightenment (or eating lentils).
The reality is much less glamorous. Sometimes it is simply stopping by a gate beside a meadow for a minute or two. Feeling the air on my skin. Watching light move through the trees. Listening to grasses shifting in the breeze.
And realising that for those few moments, my mind has gone quiet.
Not empty. Just quiet.
The gremlin still exists, but these days he finds himself sharing shoulder space with a rather magnificent winged angel glowing in gold and turquoise.
Whenever the gremlin starts up, the angel politely informs him that his opinion has been noted and then blasts him off into the distance with a large purple bazooka.
Sometimes it takes a few attempts. But the angel usually wins.
The point isn't that negative thoughts disappear. The point is that we learn we have a choice about whether to believe them. And that choice often appears in moments of quiet.
One of my favourite moments of the day is completely ordinary. There is a gate beside the meadow near my home. Sometimes I stop there for a minute. Just a minute.
No great meditation practice. No profound spiritual experience. I simply stand still.
The air moves across my skin. Light filters through the trees. The grasses move in the breeze. My mind becomes quiet.
And in that moment I realise that nothing is missing. Everything is exactly as it should be.
Moving thoughts back to the positive
Recently I had one of those moments sitting on a driftwood bench beside my terrace.
At the time I was feeling upset about something that had happened. My neighbour had spitefully cutt down my flower bored (and you know how much I love my flower border!)
My first thoughts immediately headed towards frustration and sadness.
The gremlin was delighted. 'Revenge', he cried! 'hate them, go and have an argument!"
But as I sat there, I began to notice what was actually around me.
beyond their reach Foxgloves & Campanula were still flowering, Nepeta spilling over the borders like a soft lilac waterfall. Bees moving from flower to flower. A meadow blue butterfly. A red admiral. Even a hummingbird hawk moth visiting the garden.
And suddenly I felt an overwhelming sense of peace. Nothing had really changed. The situation was exactly the same.
But my attention had shifted.
Nature had gently reminded me that there was still beauty, still abundance and still joy all around me. I wasn't alone. Nature had me in her arms. 'I've got you, she said'.
And slowly my attention shifted. Nothing outside me changed. Something inside me did. Instead of anger or upset I felt pity, compassion for those with such petty lives.
That is the gift nature offers so generously. Not escape but perspective.
The stories people tell
I've seen similar things happen for collectors of my work over the years.
One woman told me she used to come home stressed and exhausted each evening and reach automatically for a bottle of wine.
Three of my flower paintings hung opposite her sofa.
Over time she found herself sitting quietly and becoming absorbed in them instead, the colours, the atmosphere, the sense of space.
Gradually she realised she no longer needed the wine quite so often.
The paintings didn't solve her problems. They simply created a pause. A place to breathe.
Another couple commissioned a painting of a place that had been deeply important to them when they first fell in love.
Years later, they told me that since hanging it above their fireplace they found themselves talking differently. Instead of discussing the practicalities of everyday life, they found themselves sharing memories, dreams and stories from their younger years.
The painting became a doorway back to connection. Back to themselves. Back to each other.
Which makes me wonder whether what we are really searching for isn't distraction at all.
Connection is all
Perhaps what we're searching for is connection. Connection to our true selves. Connection to each other. Connection to Nature. Connection to what matters.
And perhaps that's why modern life can sometimes feel so exhausting. Because I sometimes wonder whether, in a world of constant communication, we have become more disconnected than ever.
Messages fly backwards and forwards all day long. Yet genuine heart-to-heart conversations seem increasingly rare.
We scroll. We consume. We distract ourselves.
And all the while we are often searching for the very thing that silence can help us find.
Ourselves.
The goal isn't to stop thoughts. The goal isn't to become perfectly peaceful.
The goal is simply to notice. To notice where your mind has gone. To notice which stories are speaking. And then gently decide whether they deserve your attention.
Life isn't about eliminating the noise. Nor is it about hiding from the world. It's about finding a balance between activity and stillness, people and solitude, conversation and contemplation.
A balance that allows us to return to ourselves again and again.
So if quiet time feels uncomfortable, perhaps that's okay. Perhaps there is nothing wrong with you. Perhaps you've simply discovered a doorway.
And maybe, just maybe, the silence you've been avoiding is not your enemy after all. It might be your friend. Because in that quiet space you may discover that you are never truly alone.
You can reach out to the people you love. You can reach out to the natural world.
And if that still doesn't feel enough, imagine a golden-winged angel carrying a purple bazooka standing guard beside you.
Just in case the gremlin gets any ideas.
Nature has a way of holding us when we need it most. And in that stillness, if we allow ourselves to listen, we may find not only connection.
We may find ourselves.
