What does it mean to be "productive"?
My clients who are completely rethinking their lives or standing in the aftermath of huge life-altering events say to me: “I am not doing anything”. And in their minds, this is not only bad but potentially dangerous.
When I was rethinking my professional life, studying new self-development processes, doing deep practice to learn how to coach better, healing deep childhood trauma, building wonderful new friendships, painting and writing daily, exploring new career options, and oh, yes, creating my own healing process to resolve 30 years of suffering with a debilitating health condition I would lament, but I am not being “productive”
When my clients say this to me, I see that they are moving mountains.
But what they mean, and what I meant back then was: “I am not doing the things the world recognizes as “productive” and gives you money for”.
When we look around in the world, so much of what we actually see is the literal tip of the iceberg. When we see visible success, we see the cream on the top of a very big, very tall sundae.
What we see in the material world, and especially in the marketplace of the material world is the output, the end result. And often, that is what we pay money for.
What we don’t see is the massive amount of invisible work that goes into creating that outcome.
It is sort of like a film. You sit in your living room and watch an hour of entertainment. What you don’t see is the months or even years of production. The tedium of script writing. The months of putting together the financing, hiring the team, managing locations, the months of setbacks when the main actor pulls out, and the drama over the catering company meltdown in the middle of filming.
So much of what we label as “success” is like the finished film. We see the polished, edited, version, shaped for our convenience and consumption-wonderful if all we want to do is enjoy the movie.
But if we want to make our own movie, we need to learn about all the nitty gritty, messy, behind-the-scenes stuff.
When I was reconsidering my life, I expected myself to be able to do all the heavy, hard work I was doing while also functioning at the professional standard I was used to. I beat myself up over it. I worried about money.
At one point I was spending most of my days just exploring my inner world with Internal Family Systems Therapy, experimenting with using somatic experiencing and exploring how to use writing and journaling to heal. I wondered if I had completely lost the plot. But I was compelled to continue.
During this time the apartment building that housed my childhood holiday home was sold and demolished. When I walked past the site there was nothing but a massive hole.
It felt like a perfect metaphor. I was in the process of tearing down the edifices in my life I had built on trauma.
When I looked closer, I saw it was not just a big, deep hole. They were building deep, strong foundations for a much bigger, new building.
I started to see the work I was doing as building my foundations. I stopped criticizing myself. I stopped worrying. I started to trust the process.
I trusted that my work would translate into output the world would value and pay me for.
When my clients are “doing nothing”, or not “being productive” they are digging that foundation. The deeper they can go, the bigger the house they can build.
It takes massive courage to step out of the cultural illusions we have about what is “productive” or not.
Our dark nights of the soul offer the opportunity to do the digging we need in order to rise again higher than before.
I have come to see that the invisible work we do, the work we do to be better and healthier and more connected to ourselves can provide an unshakable foundation for our future dreams. It is the most productive work we might ever do.
I am teaching a free workshop on Saturday, June 24th. Click here to find out more and register.
If you want to maximize your own productivity by going INSIDE book in for a free life coaching consultation with me. I promise you will find our time productive and leave our conversation with insights, clarity, and direction.