A client who has made great strides in changing her work habits to be more sustainable made a great observation yesterday. Her day had been one of the busier ones she’d had in a while. In exploring ways that she could have mitigated some of the craziness, she realized that she had done something differently.

Before, while waiting for her printer to finish printing, she’d scan her desk for other things that needed to get done. A quick email here, a quick phone call there–a multi-taking maven. This time, she simply waited for the printer to finish doing its thing, and took the time to relax and deepen her breath.

The memory that came to my mind from her story was the tea house at Burningman. A woman giving a tour said that creating the tea house, which was made from found objects and food packaging, was an effort to create precious space out of non-precious materials.

By choosing to mono-task and breath instead of multi-task, my client created a little pocket of healing time in her busy day. Normally on a day as busy as this one, she’d feel completely burnt out at the end. While she was indeed tired, she was far from fried.

She loved the concept of creating mini-healing times during the day–and so I pass it on to you to try too!