Lessons in Learning How to Rest, Part Six.

Lesson Six: He said. She said. Cut the chatter.

When I was a little girl I liked to pretend that I was the CEO of a company on the verge of a hostile take-over. I would hold multiple conference calls all day, shouting orders to lower level employees about how "this" was a rush and "that" had to get done by the end of the work day. My favorite part of the fantasy was the conference calls with multiple people where we all dispensed our wisdom on the subject at hand. I had watched my dad hold a number of professional phone calls as a kid, memorizing his every gesture. So, I knew exactly what to say to my imaginary conversational counterparts. Ah yes, conference calls were the best!

Now, however, my life has become one giant conference call. All day long my phone lights up while simultaneously making noise notifying me of the hundreds of people waiting to have a conversation in about fifty different ways. And I have no one to blame but myself for the constant barrage of communication. I wanted it. I was convinced that I needed it. My daily dose of advice, input, the constant clicking of tongues.

I realized this week that my childhood fantasy of talking all day long had become a nightmare. There was no light at the end of the tunnel that constantly reverberated with the hum of a million voices. No peaceful land in sight away from the white noise of conversing. And while my dad taught me the art of making a well delivered phone call, he also gave me good advice last year: "Stop listening to what everyone else has to say and just do whatever it is that YOU wanna do. Cut out the constant chatter, kid." 

So, I finally decided to take his advice this week. One year later, but I'm taking it nonetheless! I've ruthlessly stopped returning phone calls. I answer only the necessary emails in short and concise sentences that don't signal a reply. I've banished my phone to silent mode and have started leaving it in other rooms of the house, out of earshot. I've turned off. I've shut down. I've cut it all out. And I've come to a conclusion: I've known what to do all along, but stubbornly insisted on hearing everyone else out first. I don't need to have endless phone calls day and night in order to make the right decisions for me. But I do need to take a serious break from all the chatter.