Why not?

I missed this post over at Zen Habits (I clacked when I should have clicked in the feed reader, I suppose), but thankfully the internet has redundancies and Mindy posted it to catch my eye. (She did it just for me, right).

“The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.” – Bertrand Russell

Post written by Leo Babauta. Follow Leo on Twitter.

I was sitting outside my new home yesterday (we just moved last week, and we love the new place), watching the world go by.

There were people in cars, in a hurry to get to their next appointment. There were birds flying by, insects just as busy as the people in cars, plants and weeds thriving in the humid Guam climate.

Inside the house, my children were also busy, as ever, making a mess of the house (which my wife and I would soon clean up), getting into things, their natural curiosity overpowering our previous pleas for them not to play with lotion or take things apart.

The sky was slightly overcast and there was a cool breeze, quite strong and pleasant actually.

It’s not often that most of us just sit quietly, and allow the world to pass us by.

Why not?

What is so important that it can’t wait until later? What email must be answered right this moment? Do we really need to read all those articles online, all those messages from others, all those newspapers and magazines? Do we need to have the television and radio and Internet on all the time?

Is life passing us by as we keep our minds super-busy? Are we missing out on the beautiful world around us as we constantly think about the future — what we need to do, our anxieties about what might happen — and the past — what we did wrong, what someone else did to us, what we said, what should have happened?

When was the last time you just sat, and observed? Why not do it today?

sitting on the dark of the bay

“It is a mistake to think you can solve any major problems just with potatoes.”

– Douglas Adams, Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy

I apologize if I’m boring y’all with this recent string of entries. I’m doing some research, trying to organize some thoughts, and this seems like as good a place as any to sort things out.

First up tonite: Darkness therapy. (Yes, I’ve been obsessed with light therapy, this is the Dark Side of that Force. Heh.)

Here’s a nice article which covers some of what happens with darkness and light and the body.

Check this out:

Here’s another angle on light and dark: suppose that the appearance of light every morning can reset your clock only when you’ve had enough darkness. Maybe the brain needs to be able to see the contrast? What would happen if you didn’t get enough darkness? Maybe you’d lose your biological rhythm entirely; your body wouldn’t know when to make you sleep and when to wake you up. You’d be up in the middle of the night sometimes, for days in a row, backwards to real time. Then you might be so asleep during the real day you could hardly get out of bed; getting up in the morning would feel like getting up from sleep in the middle of the night does for the rest of us, ugh.

So, in a nutshell: your biological clock appears to need darkness just as much as it needs light. And some people are more sensitive to this need than others. If you aren’t getting enough sleep, look at cutting out blue light (blue blockers FTW!), turning off the TV and computer at least 2 hours before bedtime, and getting a cheap eye mask. Don’t turn on bright lights if you have to get up in the night to pee or eat or check email (oops, see above about not using the computer).

Hmmm.

The same guy, talking about exercise. Physical benefits? Of course. Mood benefits? YES!

Hey, a mood chart!

Just this one web site will give me plenty of reading material.

bright light! bright light!

Kudos if you know what movie the title is from 😛

I found another article on light therapy, interesting stuff:

Do the lights really work?

Researchers at more than 15 medical centers and clinics in both the U.S. and abroad have had much success with light therapy in patients with clear histories of SAD for at least several years. Marked improvement is usually observed within a week, if not sooner, and symptoms usually return in about the same amount of time when the lights are withdrawn. Most users, therefore, maintain a consistent daily schedule beginning, as needed, in fall or winter and usually continuing until the end of April, by which time outdoor light is sufficient to maintain good mood and high energy. Some people can skip treatments for one to three days, occasionally longer, without ill effect, but most start to slump quickly when treatment is interrupted.

How do the lights work?

The therapeutic level of illumination has several known physiological effects, though its therapeutic mechanism is still unclear. Blood levels of the light-sensitive hormone melatonin, which may be abnormally high at certain times of day, are rapidly reduced by light exposure. Depending on when bright light is presented, the body’s internal clock–which controls daily rhythms of body temperature, hormone secretion, and sleep patterns–shifts ahead or is delayed when stimulated by light. These physiological time shifts may be the basis of the therapeutic response. Light may also amplify the day-night difference in these rhythms. Research into the possible mechanisms is currently underway, and the final answer is not yet in.

Source is here.

Side note: my son takes melatonin to help go to sleep, and suffers from depression as well. Hmm.