Appreciate the process
This thought came to me while I was doing my daily setup of my desk.
My desk has multiple purposes.
More contrary to this, I use my desk for writing articles, to which I exclusively write with my Mac Pro. Not because I’m an Apple fanboy but because I believe in the importance of your environment while you work.
I have my Mac for what I believe are important tasks, and then my PC for playing games or discord calls. I separate the two so that I’m never distracted by the possibilities of exploration in my favorites games.
If given the option with ease, I would very likely just play video games even if I know that something more important will benefit me. Our brains work in mysterious ways. More on that another time.
Likely, whenever you do something you do often, chances are you’ve done it that particular way almost every time. That isn’t a glitch in reality but in fact the reason why we are able to do so many things so well with so little thought.
There are a lot of different ways you could break down that process. You could call it flow, routine, perhaps even habit. Regardless, we seem to go about the said thing with little thought floating in an almost tranquil state.
There is a beauty to the process we fail to notice. Sometimes doing the same thing too many times in a row becomes boring or we become upset by the lack of change in our lives. If you viewed the act itself in a different light, you might come to appreciate it.
I am a strong believer in passion. When we are passionate about what we do, we are more willing to dig deeper and connect concepts that will help not only ourselves but many others. The calmness you feel when going about making your morning coffee or your daily commute can be meditative if you let yourself be aware of it.
I’ve let my morning become a therapeutic process. Maybe for you, some other time of the day you feel a real sense of calm and connectedness with yourself. The idea that we need to be productive at certain times of the day I believe goes against the way we have evolved through thousands of years of trial and error.
Let that sink in.
The way we process or do anything, it’s taken thousands of years to become this advanced. Behind the closed doors of our subconscious minds, the inner workings of how our species has come into existence is at play. Whether you believe that we were placed here by a higher being or that we came literally from the ground up doesn’t really matter.
What matters is that we are here now and we are capable of great things if we set our mind to it.
A directional change for self awareness came to me when I found out about minimalism.
Taking on a mindset of minimalist and essentialist values made me question the things I needed, viewing the routines I had in place came as byproduct. Through questioning if I needed something or reliving the memories connected through the object, I was able to see the process of its use without even realizing it.
The amount of appreciation I had for an object was almost directly connected to the process in which it was used. Broken down, if it was a process I could appreciate or just shelf space.
Appreciation can be noticed in a lot of different ways. However that way is found, you can’t deny the effect it has on you. Immediately you feel a connection to that thing, person, or event.
There isn’t a way that I can tell you how to appreciate things more or to appreciate things in general. But if you take the time to notice how you go about your daily life and how one thing connects to another and so on, you will start to see how everything gradually falls together.
You may already feel a sense of gratitude or appreciation for small things in your life. If you visualize the entirety of how you came to be, that appreciation will become much greater.
We all play a small role in the lives we live, but in the way we connect makes that role much larger.
Appreciate the process.
I sincerely hope that in reading this, you have gained insight into your own appreciation for the things you do.
