I did something yesterday I haven’t done in at least 3 years, but which I used to routinely do when I was a teenager. I washed our cars. Just like we’ve outsourced so many other parts of our life, my wife and I typically go to the local car wash to get our cars scrubbed, cleaned and vacuumed. Usually while this is being done, I sit in a chair scrolling through messages in a futile attempt to catch up with my digital life.
Well, yesterday was a beautiful sunny afternoon and both of our cars were filthy, so I decided I would resurrect the art and practice of washing and vacuuming both our cars. Surprisingly I enjoyed the experience thoroughly and it even reconnected me to my teenage years when I had the chore of washing my parents’ cars regularly.
Bathing in direct sunlight, I appreciated how washing our cars involved various complex movements involving upper and lower body. Overhead reach to wash the roof of the car (using alternate arms), squatting to clean the tires, and a lot of turning and twisting to engage the core. Total full-body range of motion with the single-minded, un-distracted task of simply getting our cars clean (I deliberately left the phone inside).
These used to be the routine acts of daily life that happened to put us outdoors, in motion, and focused (without pinging and buzzing devices and notifications), which we are now losing touch with and which our children might never experience again. Such activities and daily chores naturally kept us healthier and more mindful without us having to engage in some formalized practice of getting exercise in a gym or enrolling in a mindfulness meditation course. Don’t get me wrong; I appreciate these types of structured activities, but I also miss how these practices just used to be a natural and spontaneous part of everyday life.
Our constant focus on productivity and efficiency has taken us away from the simple pleasures of washing our cars, gardening or simply visiting the local market to pick up produce – which can now be delivered with a few taps of our smartphone. I wrote a prior post on the health benefits of these activities, which are referred to as non-exercise physical activity (aka “NEPA”) and pointed out that gym-based exercises in the absence of sufficient NEPA still raises the risk of obesity, diabetes, heart disease and other chronic health conditions.
After washing the cars, my mind was rested, refreshed and far more productive when I did jump back into my digital life. I wrote this piece in under 20 minutes and had a bunch of fresh ideas which simply wouldn’t have happened if I was sitting at the car wash scrolling through an endless inbox.
Washing our cars fittingly allowed me to clear the accumulated mental dust and debris from the endless to-do lists and recurrent thoughts which actually impairs us from accessing our higher brain (aka pre-frontal cortex), and it’s this higher brain where your next great idea lives.
In my experience (and maybe yours), great ideas don’t happen in front of brightly lit screens. You can stare at that laptop, tablet or smartphone all you want, trying to come up with a breakthrough business idea, the next bestseller, or an engaging blog post, but the real ideas and creative forces often live outside your digital world. You may find those illusive answers after a run or hike in nature, spending time in your garden, an afternoon nap, or even after washing your car. Keep looking for these opportunities and pay attention to how you think and feel afterwards.
Best of Health,
Good read. So true.