Listening to Oprah.com/anewearth, Ch. 4, Minute 13+, Eckhart commented sumthin’ very useful to me.
First, “It is much more likely that your planning is going to be fruitful if it is proceeded by a period of presence and stillness. Any mind activity is much more likely to be beneficial and creative if it is proceeded by a period of presence and stillness.” So, walking in the woods–being PRESENT on your walk–proceeding planning, for example.
Then… “Then you apply the mind and say, ‘Ok, what do I have to do today,’ and then you make a list…”
When he made this second point, something totally clicked for me. I’m still mulling it over, but basically…
For a long time, I’ve adhered to this idea that it’s a good idea to plan. (Not that I do it as much as I think I should. Procrastination.) It seems so many resources are wasted in the world, simply from lack of planning, from my personal time to vast quantities of water, energy, etc. However, most people don’t feel that planning is important enough to warrant stopping what they are doing to plan (“I’m too busy to think about what I’m doing!”), and some even specifically rebel against this activity (like the last guy I dated; he had this samscaric thing against planning ahead).
My little ego feels vindicated: “Enlightened guy saying I’M RIGHT! You’re supposed to plan!” Of course, that’s not what Eckhart said at all. He simply said that if you’re going to plan, it and any activity requiring thinking is best proceeded by a period of presence, and then you enter into planning (or whatever thinking activity), and then you return to presence.
However, this is where I got excited. You see, he went on to say, “Once you’ve done that then you know this is what I have to do, so you’re not continuously in the next moment; you don’t project yourself…” This basically sums up my underlying feeling that it’s a good idea to dedicate time today to planning for tomorrow. Then, once that activity is “complete,” you can go about being present today. For people without responsibilities, perhaps this scenario doesn’t’t apply, but for most of us…
I’ve always sort of wondered at my “positivity” that planning is a good idea. Sure I’m organized and such, but this feels like it hits the nail on the head. In fact, now that I’m typing about it, I am reminded of a story I told my friend the other day about my time management while in the Green MBA program…
It was about five or six weeks until the end of the semester. Due dates were approaching, and I felt sure I was so far behind the ball, I could really fail. So what did I do? I got my smelly markers (berry, lemon, apple) and some large pieces of drawing paper and drew out a time line for the rest of the time I had between that day and the end of the semester. I calculated approximately how many minutes I spent doing each expected task each day, and after all of those mundane things were taken care of (from sleeping to showering to working to transportation between point a and b), how many minutes per day I had available for actual homework.
Then I guestimated how many hours I needed to complete each project. Compairing how much productive time I had available to how many hours of homework I had, I deduced that I had enough time, with a bit to spare, before the end of the semester.
Fewf!!! What a relief! And here I was sure I was too far behind, period. This process (that took no more than about two hours max) enabled me to be more present for each assignment than I would have otherwise been, worried I didn’t have time to really concentrate, because I had this and that and this and that still to attend to. And in the end, I did complete everything, more less on time!
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