The beauty of doing nothing
Photo by Raheel Qureshi/Dawn.com
I moved to America almost 15 years ago and decided never to look back. A very wise man had once advised me, ‘when you move on in life, always look forward, think about the future, cherish your past, relish your memories, learn from your mistakes but never languish your history or the road not taken. The best place and time in your life is now, never lose sight of that.’ This is the best advice I ever received, and one I highly recommend.
I was raised in an upper middle class professional household and my elders made me very aware of the difference between gainfully involved and enjoyably relaxed from a very young age. I grew up enjoying a lifestyle that most in Pakistan do. Surrounded by extended family, cousins, weddings, Eid, wonderful neighbours, childhood friends, family friends, chai, colloquial language, ethnic influences, afternoon siestas, desi food and the list goes on, and thus developed a personality and an outlook enriched with experiences from south east Asia.
I value my past and upbringing for it keeps me grounded and helps appreciate my present. First generation immigrants, for the most part, remain primarily humble because the reality of not being born here and the colour of one’s skin is an inescapable truth and one that I would never want to change. However what I would like to change is the pace of life here.
Granted, my appreciation for some American values is immense. It teaches one to work hard from the very onset of life, in my opinion it is the hardest working nation in the world and promises a good life in return. It nurtures the basic human nature of competitiveness and assures a reward at the end of the day, but in return it takes away something valuable and irreplaceable, a beautiful little something the Italians call Il bel far niente and it means `the beauty of doing nothing.’
I recently came across this phrase in a book and it jumped at me. Yes it did, for I have noticed of late that I actually feel guilty if I am not doing a task – that is so anti my upbringing. I distinctly remember my training had a course in `hanging with the aimless self‘. I may not have fully appreciated the value of doing nothing at the time, but I also do not remember feeling erroneous about it. Where did the pleasure of momentary purposelessness go and what have I replaced it with? The answer is simple, the American lifestyle that expects one to work, work and work and never not do ‘nothing’.
I pause for a moment and reflect on the advice I got so long ago, ‘relish your memories’. I vividly remember a gorgeous November afternoon, some thirteen autumns ago, uniquely Karachisque when the temperature was a wee bit cool and a wee bit warm, just about perfect to be under a khais and a ceiling fan all at once. The slow motion of the fan was churning the atmosphere in the room at my mental pace. I remember staring at the fan and counting its rotation to the length of the Benjamin Sisters song ‘Aaye mausam rangeilay suhanay’. The song was playing somewhere far way, maybe on a radio or a cassette player, at a neighbour’s house or at a construction sight. The music kept coming and going to the beck and call of the changing wind! Then came the sound of a dhol; somewhere close by there was a wedding happening while I lay in bed playing hide in seek with nothingness, fleeting thoughts, vague awareness and passing images. Pure magic!
Maybe this kind of momentary and transient aimlessness is nirvana, or maybe not, but surely it does something for the mind and body that is relevant and substantial for maintaining sanity. Taking a breather, a pause from the routine humdrum has to be a good thing, but the American lifestyle stops for no one. It runs and expects one to run with it, the race to the finish line is hard and if one stops to catch their breath then the camaraderie reprimand one to get back in the race. Panting, listless and thirsty one gets back into the game, refusing to stop for a chai break with the self.
This country has taken something very precious away from me, and from most, the inherent need to take a moment off, pause and listen to the sound of silence, sit aimlessly and at times simply do absolutely nothing.
Bisma Tirmizi is a writer based in Las Vegas
