“Solitude is disappointing before it’s fulfilling.” – Darrin Patrick
This goes without saying, but I’m interested in myself. What makes me tick. Why I think the way I do. Why I fail so often. I’m not interested in navel gazing, but I’m genuinely interested in learning about how God created me and who he created me to be.
Solitude is a necessary discipline of a life well lived; however, it’s not something that comes naturally. It’s an active discipline that we need to plan for, care for, and practice.
What is it?
Solitude is an active pursuit of myself and who I am created to be. Real solitude has always been something I’ve experienced, not something I’ve done.
Solitude is not going into my basement, crossing my legs, and saying a bunch of “om’s.” It is also not “clearing my mind” or “freeing my mind” as some have suggested. Instead it is an active engagement of my will, my intellect, and my emotions for a brief period of time with the outcome being a better understanding of myself, leading to action items to better my life and lives of those I touch.
Todd Duncan says the practice of solitude must have a defined start time and end time. It also must be accompanied by action items.
The first time you attempt to practice solitude it can feel a little silly. If you are anything like me you cannot sit still for 10 minutes without having thoughts of work, family, entertainment, and the fact that I’m a little hungry – I could eat. The good news is that embracing solitude will help you put some structure around types of thoughts.
Here is how to have a successful day of solitude that leads to action items which will improve your quality of life.
Preparing for a day of Solitude
Before embarking on your first Solitude journey it will be important to do the following:
- Plan a time. It’s critical you give yourself 8-10 hours. This means you need to cut or drastically limit contact with the outside world for this period of time. It also means you need to get a good nights sleep the day(s) leading up to this time. It means treating the day the same way you would a workday – at your desk by 8am, then at your place of solitude by 8am too.
- Prepare a place. Put yourself in a place where you cannot be distracted by the outside world. Starbucks seems like a good choice, but a guy spilling his coffee on his shirt might cost you 20 minutes, that group of loud college kids might cost you another 20 minutes, and the dad disciplining his kid over there might cost you another 20 minutes. Being pulled out of this focused mindset and then having to get back into will take at least 20 minutes, so don’t sell yourself short by choosing a poor location.
- Pack a lunch. Don’t underestimate the power of lunchtime. Leaving your place to hit the nearest Chick-Fil-A will not only cost you ~45-60 minutes in real time, but dreaming about it 15 minutes beforehand and the time coming out of it can be very costly. Not to mention if you choose a really heavy lunch it can kill your entire afternoon. Packing a light lunch can be the key to a successful afternoon.
- Procure the main resources: A journal to write in, three pens (you’ll know why when it happens), a favorite book that spurs your thinking, and an iPod full of both pump-up and mellow music.
Once you’ve done these preparatory steps you are ready to face the day.
Conducting a day of Solitude
As I stated earlier, it is important to treat this day like a typical work day. The first part of a typical Scott Lewis workday is 8am to 5pm (then again 8pm to midnight). When I go out for a day of solitude this is how I typically divide my day.
7am to 8am – Breakfast, Read ESPN, chat with Stephanie and the kids, etc.
8am to 9am – Conduct a normal time with God. My normal daily quiet time ranges from 15 minutes to 60 minutes, but on a day like this it is important slow down and spend time in God’s word. I follow Darrin Patrick’s ROAD model when I read the scriptures (Read, Observe, Apply, Dedicate in Prayer).
9am to 12pm – Read my journal. I read it the same way I would a textbook or business book. Look for key dates, milestones, important people, etc. I often take a piece of scratch paper and write down a tally for how many times I mention my wife, my kids, my church, my job, and other important things in my life. The saying goes that if you want to see what is important to a person read their checkbook register. It is also true of their journal.
If you’ve never picked up a journal before or written down your thoughts before it might seem a little goofy. “Grown ups don’t keep diaries” is what a man once told me. There is a lot of power in clarifying your thoughts, emotions, and intentions on paper. A mentor once told me that “you cannot really have a real, tangible thought unless you can communicate it on paper.” Take the 90 minutes and write about one thing – your job, your marriage, your mom – it doesn’t matter. You’re exercising a new muscle so keep it simple – who, what, when, where, and why. Sprinkle in some of how you feel so you can sift your true motives. Then take the second hour and read what you’ve written. Think about it – really press your mind down on it. Then write a little more in the 90 minutes about what you’ve learned about yourself. Periodically stop and read what you’ve written, clarify your thoughts as if you’re talking with another person. You’re sifting yourself, so do it well.
12pm to 1pm – Lunch Take an hour to relax. Eat your lunch. Take a walk. Let your mind take a breather from all the work you’ve put in to this point. Whatever you do though, do not use this time to read Foxnews or ESPN. Picking up your iPad to “just check a few emails” completely destroys the separated environment you’ve created. There will be a fire at work “that only you can solve.” The reality is that it can wait. Don’t let the good steal the great here. If you need some entertainment during lunch grab a newspaper in the Preparing for a Day of Solitude step. That is disconnected enough from the world spinning by.
1pm to 2pm – Take the book that I referenced earlier and thumb through it for the next hour. Go to the places in the book that you’ve underlined and dog-eared. Let your mind soak in the words of the author and be filled from their words.
2pm to 5pm – Take out your journal and scratch paper that you’ve done your inventory on. If this is your first time journaling, don’t sweat it. Bucket your life into major categories. My categories are:
Personal – all things related to me, my growth, my development, etc.
Family – all things related to those in my immediate family
Church – all things related to people at church and ministries I’m involved in
Community – all things related to extended family, friends, etc.
Finances & Vocation – all things related to personal finances and work
A quick word on “life buckets.” You don’t want to have too many. 3-5 is really the right way to think about life. Too much detail and separation can cause fragmentation in your thinking. There is a lot of overlap within the 5 I have and rather than trying to itemize my life into minutia, embrace the overlap and let that drive your planning.
Now grab a second piece of paper and jot down the same life buckets. Think about life life 12 months from now. What do you want life to look like in each of the buckets? If you want to be growing personally, what will be true of you 12 months from now if you’ve accomplished it? If you want to be promoted in your job, what title will you have? What will your salary be? If you desire to be a better husband what will your wife say of you?
Asking questions of yourself that lead you saying “12 months from now I will be a father that …….” and you fill in the statement.
Here are some examples from my life.
- Personal: 12 months from now I want to have attended at least one Green Bay Packers game with my dad.
- Family: At Christmas time I want to be able to take my family into Chicago for two days to experience Christmas time in the city.
- Church: Captain a basketball team while remaining focused on the growth of the men in the group
- Community: Check-in with my out of state friends at least once every 90 days.
Each of the preceding statements paints of a picture of who I want to be in the next 12 months. The experiences I want to have that will shape me. The relationships I want to foster that will keep me. The learnings I want to garner that will help transform me into the man God is creating me to be.
The key to this is not to get bogged down into details (yet) or into including everything. You’ll know when you’ve exhausted a category when you begin to think of things you’ve already planned or they become so insignificant that you really don’t care if they are accomplished or not. And if you’re like me you’ll start to get frustrated because you cannot think of any more!
This next part is the last, and best, part of the day. Take your two sheets of scratch paper and grab your calendar. We are going to begin methodically plotting the next 12 months.
Start in bucket one, statement one. Now ask yourself “What is needed to accomplish this in my life?” And start to write those thoughts down on the scratch paper under the statement. You may need resources. You may need buy-in from others. You may need money. Whatever it is begin to jot those things down.
Now with your calendar in hand lets begin to break those into tasks that you enter into the calendar.
Let’s use”Going to the Packers game with my dad” as an example. This seems stupid but there are actually some steps to it that you simply cannot slap together. First, I need to ask my dad if he’s interested in going with me. Second, we need to find a game or two that we’d both enjoy attending. Third, I need to make sure I have ~$600 for tickets. Fourth, I actually need to buy the tickets. And finally, we need to figure out how we’re getting to Lambeau.
All of those things seem silly, but without methodically planning this the “Packers game with dad” will never happen. If it was important enough to put down in the experiences I want to have in the next 12 months, then it’s important enough to plan.
So on my calendar in the next 7 days I will plan a task of “talk with dad about going to a game.” In the next 14 days I will create a task for finding a game we both agree we’d like to attend. In the next 30 days I will create a task for getting the $600. This may be the hardest. If I don’t have I’ll need to earn it. That’s what I need to plan. Do I need to work more hours in the next 30 days? Do I need to start another business? Do I need to put things on eBay? Getting $600 isn’t easy, but if you methodically plan, it doesn’t have to be complicated. Once I’ve done all this, I will create a task for buying the tickets. Then put the game on the calendar.
Going through each of your statements and planning the tasks into your calendar creates a roadmap for you to follow over the next 12 months. Having a roadmap to follow is much easier than trying to make it up as you go alone.
Peter Drucker famously said “What’s measured improves.” This process is about measuring what we previously thought we couldn’t measure or didn’t measure simply because we didn’t know how.
The benefits of performing the day of solitude this way ensure that you in touch with the reality happening around you. It also gives the opportunity to alter that reality going forward.
Please let me know you conduct learning about yourself. I’m always fascinated by the creativity of people and how they learn about themselves.