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Camino de Santiago: People – Commentary Lesson

Hi, this is Kristin. Welcome back to the commentary for the conversation Camino de Santiago: People. If you remember from the conversation, Joe and AJ were speaking about, one of the things they were speaking about that the Camino did for them was to simplify their life while they were walking. Y’know, they walked for a little over 30 days so during that time their life was very simple.

All they were doing was basically walking all day, eating some meals, meeting people and going to sleep. It was very simple. I can relate to this in a different way. I did not walk the Camino with them but I can relate to having more of a simplified life from doing some meditations retreats, some Vipassana meditation retreats to be specific. I’ve done three of them and each of them were ten days long each.

And they’re done in silence so you don’t speak. You’re not speaking to other people. So all you’re doing all day is meditating, eating and then sleeping. That’s all. So…and when you take away speaking as well, it really, after ten days when you finish doing something like this, having such a simple life, it really removes a lot of the busyness that’s in your head, or the clutter, I think as Joe talked about in the conversation.

Your thinking, your mind becomes so clear. You almost feel, you feel lighter. You almost feel like a new person. It’s almost like, like you know how you charge a battery? It’s almost like when you do something like this where you really simplify your life, it’s almost like recharging yourself.

So also when you remove the busyness from your life it allows you to be much more connected to who you truly are as a person. And this then also allows you to be able to connect more deeply with people. You’re just a lot more present with people. You don’t…when you’re speaking to people you don’t, if you don’t have a lot of busyness going on in your head, you’re able to make deeper connections with them.

So it’s really important to have times in your life where you’re able to remove the clutter or remove the busyness. And, y’know, times where you’re able to really slow down, even if it’s just something simple like going out into nature, that’s a really wonderful way of slowing down and removing a lot of busyness in your mind.

It’s important to do this because if you’re constantly, if your mind is constantly busy, it can create stress in your life. And over time stress can start to break your body down. It can start creating disease, all sorts of physical problems over time. It’s not…stress is not good for you. It’s not healthy. It’s not healthy for your mind. It’s not healthy for your body. So it’s very important to take times where you’re able to slow down and really just remove that busyness and just quiet your mind.

Y’know, technology is…it’s something that can be very useful, obviously. But it can also make our lives a little complex and it can make our lives busy, too. I want to give you an example of how it can make you busy and multitasking, although you can multitask without technology, but in this example my nephew, who I’m going to talk about was actually multitasking. Multitasking means doing several things at one time. So you’re not very present or very focused on one thing when your attention, your focus is spread to many different things.

So Joe and I were visiting my family in Georgia, Georgia is a state in the southeastern part of the United States where I grew up. We were visiting there recently and on our last night we went to dinner with my parents and my nephew and my nephew’s girlfriend. They’re 15 years old, he and his girlfriend are 15. And we went out to a restaurant, and this is the first time Joe and I, as well as my parents, were meeting my nephew’s girlfriend.

So we’re sitting at the restaurant and the whole time my nephew and his girlfriend were each on their cellphones. And when I say they were on their cellphones, I don’t mean they were speaking, they were talking on the phone, they were just playing around because they have smart phones. They were just playing around on the phones.

So they’re doing this while they’re…they’re playing on their phones, they’re talking to each other. They would talk to us but only if we asked them something. They’re eating their food. There was a TV in the restaurant so they’re watching TV sometimes as well. They’re doing all this while we just were…me and Joe and my parents were wanting to spend time with them. But it was a little difficult because they were focused on their phones and kind of focused on each other, too, as teenagers can be.

But anyway, that’s just one example of how, y’know, like I said technology can be very useful and good but you don’t want to allow technology to use you. You want to use it but don’t allow it to use you. And it was kind of taking over, technology was taking over my nephew and his girlfriend. They were so focused on their phones, they were more focused on their phones than actually being present or focused on their food or, y’know, spending time with us, me and Joe and my parents.

Okay, so I would like to know what you do to take time away from, y’know, busyness to try and clear your mind out a bit or, y’know, to take time away from a busy schedule. What is it that you do or that, y’know, that you like to do?

For me, I don’t do it as often as I would like to but I do like to go out into nature, whether it’s just walking in the woods or going out, y’know, on a boat in the ocean. I like that, too. Just being out in nature.

Going, taking a drive up into the mountains. It’s all really nice and calming for me. Especially when I’m around a lot of trees. I love that.

So share with us on the Ning site what you enjoy doing or what you would like to do more of to take away the busyness in your life. I’m going to look forward to hearing from you. Alright, have a good month. See you next time. Bye-bye.