Stop Well-DOING and Embrace Well-BEING!
Letting go of our obsession with doing awakens us to inner and outer wellness.
At the age of sixty, I considered myself a success story.
I had enjoyed a thirty-year career in a creative and challenging profession, raised a daughter as a single mother who had grown up to become a mental health counselor with a private practice, I was blessed with an adorable and loving grandson, had built a decent retirement account, and owned my own home. I’d checked all the adulting boxes. Fulfilled the game plan which, presumably, equaled happiness.
Except it didn’t.
Despite all I’d done to achieve economic independence and professional rewards, I had developed three autoimmune conditions, couldn’t recall how to be creative, and ended my career days disillusioned and directionless.
I had pursued DOING rather than BEING and, like most people, paid the price in poor health and spiritual emptiness. I remember having a visit with my general physician and answering every question about feeling depressed and unhappy with affirmatives. Yes, yes, and yes.
Sadly, this is a common affliction in our present time. My daughter sees the symptoms of doing-ness in her clients so often, she’ll never be out of work. Most of her counseling, in fact, concentrates on helping people to develop coping strategies for stress and anxiety. In other words, how to recover from the DOING syndrome.
The simple truth is that pursuing the ambition/success/rewards playbook while ignoring an equal need for rest/reflection/renewal is a backwards path to happiness.
What we need is to shift out of the mindset of doing well as the measure of success, to one of being well.
The challenge is that we are a culture of do-ers: watch Tik Tok for more than three minutes and the constant theme is how to do better: clean your oven, throw a gender reveal party, snap the best selfies. The implication being that when you do these things, your life will magically improve. What happens when it doesn’t is dis-ease, the opposite of well-being.
Well-being doesn’t come in a prescription bottle
Getting off the doing track, I discovered, isn’t as simple as hitting the drugstore for a bottle of pills nor is going cold turkey. Ambition can be a good thing when we decide to put well-being ahead of well-doing. A little motivation, like a much-needed vacation or a change in jobs, often catalyzes a journey towards higher aspirations like joy, peace, and contentment.
Paradoxically, the most challenging experiences are often what lead us to set new, self-empowering goals. Divorce, death, job loss, or a health crisis, can kickstart a search for meaning and balance in our lives.
For me, like many others, it was the pandemic. The isolation from social contact made reflection easy. I had never made a habit of journaling, but with days free of conversation, business calls, and the computer screen, I began to write, filling notebook after notebook.
When the weather turned warmer, I walked. As morning and evening rush hours trickled off, the streets grew quieter and invited slow strolls. On walking trails, people kept their distance, voices often muffled behind masks, encouraging long stretches of thoughtfulness.
For the first time in many years, I noticed the symphony of birdsong outside my window. I recognized the blooming of my neighbor’s peonies by their smell, alone, and watched the clouds drift across the sky with no agenda. I let go of strategizing my next move, and simply embraced being present.
Shifting to Being is an awakening to wellness
In the past, this immersion in not doing would have caused me intense agitation. All this time wasted! But what I experienced was the reverse: a clear mind that suddenly filled with new ideas, a rejuvenated desire for physical activity that prompted me to (finally!) buy a kayak, and a keen interest in mind-body health.
I filled my long empty spiritual cup with meditation practices under the canopy of nature. A course in intuition development led me to become a certified practitioner. I even created an Instagram account to showcase the extraordinary work of earth and land artists I was discovering on social media, slowly growing my followers from a few like-minded nature lovers into the hundreds.
One day it occurred to me that I was still doing — maybe even more than ever — but my priority was no longer to accomplish goals. I cultivated joy. Awe. Serenity. I smiled more. Felt better in my skin. The next time I saw my G. P., I gushed about my new pursuits, my healthier weight, the book I was writing. “You sound happier,” he said. I was. I had shifted from doing well to being well.
Three simple steps to shift to well-being:
1. Freedom from DOING starts with intention. Manifestation arises out of our intention. This is a powerful affirmation that we give energy to simply by stating what we desire. What is your definition of well-being? Write it down. Make the words concrete.
2. Carve out time for self-exploration and reflection. I use the “three S’s” as a way of creating the necessary space to get in touch with my inner voice: silence, solitude, and seclusion. This doesn’t mean hiding away in a cabin in the woods: solitude and seclusion can just as easily be found in your garden or by taking a drive on a country road. The goal is to limit distractions so that you can get in touch with your inner knowing and feeling: two higher cognitive abilities that draw on your deep wellspring of wisdom to provide insights and revelations. Reflect on what emerges: How do you feel when you’re in a state of Being versus Doing? What is your intuition telling you about your state of well-being? Become an active listener to your own soul.
3. Accept impermanence. Perhaps the hardest step in any positive change is letting go of our comfortable patterns and beliefs which often means letting go of some relationships, jobs, goals, or expectations. We’re conditioned to resist change, but change is necessary to evolve. No shift can occur when we hold on to an outdated program. Moving towards a 3.0 version of yourself, where well-being replaces well-doing, means over-writing the old instructions with a new algorithm. Open-hearted receptivity is the key to accepting change as growth, and not a crisis to be avoided.
4. Prioritize self-care. Most of us are guilty of not giving ourselves permission for space and private time. Especially women. But stress, physical ailments, and a host of mental health issues are the result of not dialing it down and tending to our inner life. Make yourself a priority! Close the door, take a bath, go for a walk, start a journal. Simple mindfulness practices that center us in the present moment are restorative and help us to be with others in a healthier, more conscious way.
A lifetime of benefit comes from nurturing well-being
The surprising gift that comes from letting go of our obsession with doing is that we generate the kind of intangible rewards that are deeper and longer-lasting: inner balance, emotional stability, and contentment. We release negative actions and behaviors more easily; our creative energies flow more productively; we find joy in solitude and peace in reflection. We experience well-being, not only as a momentary blip in the chaos of our days, but as a way of living.
Elle Harrigan is a contributing writer for the Religious Naturalist Association and hosts the Instagram community @livingwildwisdom focusing on mindfulness, creativity, and spirituality through encounters with nature. A Certified Intuition Practitioner (CIP), she is currently working on a personal growth book that focuses on the power of nature to unleash our inner wisdom.
