Comfortably Numb: The Lost Art of Doing Nothing
by Randy Kaufman, with research assistance from Dustin Lowman
“Busy is the new stupid.”
To live in the modern world is to be addicted to activity.
Morning dawns. Our smartphones sing with news alerts: texts, emails, social media pings. Work days begin early, proceed in a flurry of meetings, calls, and correspondences, and end late. Post-work leisure, if we have energy for it, feels fulfilling only if it’s active — seeing a show, meeting with friends, exercising, watching a film.
At every break in the action, there’s a screen to divert us. Smartphones, tablets, laptops; Facebook, Instagram, Twitter; crosswords, text chains, video games; CNN, Netflix, YouTube. According to a citation from Business Insider, U.S. adults average more than 10.5 hours of screen time per day.
When asked how we are doing, there is seemingly only one correct answer: Busy. Really, really busy. Oh, you can’t imagine how busy. Lost in the torrent of activity is a state of being as healthy as working out: Doing Nothing.
Modern citizens are losing the ability to Do Nothing. I plead guilty. I regularly work 10-hour days. When not working, I can often be found hurtling myself across the open waters in a small racing sailboat, skiing the “extremes,” hiking with my husband and dogs. Doing nothing — I don’t remember the last time that happened. When I’m walking, brushing my dogs, folding laundry, riding the subways, you’d think I rest my weary head and do nothing else. Nope — there is always something in my ears, be it a book, a Ted Talk, a podcast, or music. On the elliptical, more is more: Loud music blares in my earphones and a Kindle book rests on the shelf in front of me.
Like many people I know, I get so busy thinking about everything that I too often think about nothing.
#1 fan of Doing Nothing: Our brains.
According to Polish writer Olga Mecking, there’s a “neural network in the brain that only comes ‘online,’ or lights up in an fMRI machine, when we do nothing.” Anyone who’s ever had a eureka moment while showering, walking, driving, or otherwise on autopilot has experienced this neural network: An unoccupied mind wanders. And when the mind wanders, it finds the unexpected. Beyond a certain point, busyness actually means using less of our brains — becoming, to paraphrase Bill Gates, stupider.
This does not have to be. In this article, I explore the cross-cultural and cross-disciplinary benefits of Doing Nothing. I advocate for a middle path, toward a world more comfortable with detachment.
Channeling History
Why does Doing Nothing make us so uncomfortable? Because we tend to view it as “unproductiveness.” In our culture, unproductiveness is a deadly sin. The roots of this paradigm reach to the 1200s, when Italian philosopher Thomas Aquinas named Sloth one of the capital sins. Aquinas’s term was Acedia, a “turning away from God.”
Nine and a half centuries later, American novelist Thomas Pynchon picked up Aquinas’s threads, penning a New York Times essay entitled “The Deadly Sins/Sloth; Nearer, My Couch, to Thee.” The essay explores the hazards of confusing Doing Nothing with Sloth, averring that our culture interprets Doing Nothing as “an offense against the economy.” No matter its psychological benefits; if you’re not productive every waking moment, you’re inhibiting economic growth.
But even as much of the modern world has lost touch with Doing Nothing, some of our most prominent thinkers have extolled its virtues. Theoretical physicist Albert Einstein is perhaps the most celebrated doer of nothing. Einstein regularly lapsed into long sessions of gedankenexperimente, which early teachers punished, but which nonetheless proved central to some of his most groundbreaking discoveries.
More recently, Mecking discovered the Dutch concept of niksen while living in the Netherlands. Niksen more or less translates to “Doing Nothing.” Perhaps this is why the Netherlands and its neighbors often rank among the happiest countries in the world.
Owing to ancient religious paradigms, we instinctively associate Doing Nothing with shame. This is costly for our brains — not to mention our wallets.
Doing Nothing in Investing
“Benign neglect, bordering on sloth, remains the hallmark of our investing process.”
Fear of Doing Nothing also runs rampant in the world of investing. In his essay, “How to Be a Better Investor: Do Nothing,” Paul Brown writes about his father — a brilliant man, but a terrible investor. By trying to avoid taxes at all costs and “time the market,” Brown’s father committed costly cardinal investing sins.
In my years as a wealth manager, I’ve had countless conversations with clients who want to do something, anything, to make their portfolios grow. It makes sense to me. Humans have many biological needs; taking action is one of them. My clients, typically first-generation wealth, grew wealthy through action — growing businesses, making sound decisions. When I tell them that Doing Nothing is often the best thing they can do to nurture their investments, it seems to defy reason.
I tell them if they don’t want to take my advice, they can instead turn to Warren Buffett, the $100 billion man: “Benign neglect, bordering on sloth, remains the hallmark of our investing process.” It isn’t that Buffett makes thoughtless investments; it’s that he buys with a nearly limitless horizon. He hopes not for overnight growth, to buy one day and sell the next. He doesn’t seek the bursts of adrenaline and dopamine that result from action. He buys hoping to spur long-term, exponential growth. I’m sure he gets plenty of excitement — but not in the stock market.
The Middle Path
“A busy calendar and a busy mind will destroy your ability to create anything great.”
A middle path exists. I do not advocate for a life exclusively devoted to Doing Nothing, but perhaps greatness lies in “learning to live at two speeds,” as Merking says.
The first speed is the one we’re all comfortable with: activity. Moving quickly, getting stuff done, making incremental progress — as Pink Floyd said, being “comfortably numb.” The second speed is the one that takes some getting used to: Doing Nothing. Taking an hour to walk without a destination or goal in mind. Lying on the couch and seeing where your mind roams. Deriving comfort, not anxiety, from gaps in your schedule.
The Almanack of Naval Ravikant, by Eric Jorgenson.
You can schedule “Do Nothing” blocks of time, like Gates and Ravikant. Or, let it happen naturally. Unoccupied moments arise naturally. The next time one does, see how it feels to stay unoccupied, not filling it in with a task or a screen. Cue Einstein, Mecking, and Buffett, and Do Nothing some of the time. I know I’ll try. Will you?
Consider pairing this post with “Comfortably Numb,” one of my all-time favorite songs.
And, for your reading pleasure, try my newest favorite book: The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, by Eric Jorgenson.