Hello and welcome and today's word is the word pause.
Isn't it a great opportunity for us today to think about that concept and just take a moment to reflect.
Have you ever found yourself rushing through your day,
Moving from one task to another,
Only to realise by evening that you barely remember any of it?
Life can start to feel like a blur when we're always doing and never stopping.
Always doing and never really being.
What would happen if just for a moment you hit pause?
What might you see,
Feel or realise in that stillness?
Pausing is the intentional act of stopping.
Briefly stepping out of your life,
Stepping off the treadmill of life to breathe,
To reflect and to reconnect to yourself and possibly even beyond.
In a world that glorifies hustle and constant productivity,
Choosing to pause is an act of but it's in the pause that clarity,
Creativity and calm are actually born.
A purposeful pause is not a weakness in any way at all,
It really is a strategy.
Whether it's a deep breath before you speak,
A moment of silence in the middle of chaos or a longer break to re-evaluate your direction,
Pausing allows you to reset your nervous system,
Make wiser decisions and respond instead of react.
It's a power move and in fact more than even being a strategy,
I think it's a gift to yourself.
Now there are some great people in history who have really supported this idea of pausing and one that I'd like to mention which is very present day is the coach Mel Robbins.
She's best known for her five second rule and she teaches that a micro pause,
Just five seconds,
Can shift your mindset and change your life.
When faced with hesitation she suggests counting down five,
Four,
Three,
Two,
One and then taking action and that brief pause disrupts negative thinking and activates the prefrontal cortex,
Giving you back control.
This means you go from being reactive to responsive.
It's a simple yet profound example of how intentional pause really can lead to greater momentum.
Albert Einstein,
Often associated with brilliance and breakthrough thinking,
Einstein credited many of his insights to quiet reflective walks and violin playing,
Both forms of pause from mental strain.
He once said,
I think 99 times and find nothing.
I stop thinking,
Swim in silence and the truth comes to me.
For Einstein,
Pausing wasn't procrastination in any way.
It was part of the creative process and Arianna Huffington,
After collapsing from exhaustion in 2007,
The media mogul had a wake-up call.
She began reimagining success not as constant hustle,
But as balance and well-being.
This shift led to the creation of Thrive Global,
A company rooted in the science of rest,
Mindfulness and pause.
And her journey proves that pausing isn't falling behind,
It's reclaiming your power.
Now in 2018,
A study published in Frontiers in Psychology found that taking brief mental breaks significantly improves attention and performance,
Especially during long tasks.
Neuroscientists at the University of Southern California discovered that our brain's default mode network activates during rest,
Helping us process emotions,
Generate insights and connect past experiences to future goals.
And the Harvard Business Review reported that leaders who regularly pause to reflect make better decisions and are more effective overall.
And pause doesn't have to be silent.
We could pause from our every day by taking a run or playing golf or cooking with some great music on and just really stepping away from all the chaos.
But the pause that we give ourselves,
Also in the form of silence or in meditation,
Allows space in our mind for greater ideas to come to us and for us to give ourselves a gift of peace,
Relaxation and a true sense of safety within.
So three steps I'm going to invite you to do today or over the next week or so.
The first one is to really breathe before you speak.
Just one intentional breath can help you respond with clarity rather than react from stress.
Number two,
Schedule short pauses.
Try two to five minute breaks between tasks to reset your mind.
You might even enjoy the Pomodoro method that allows you to really focus intently for about 20 minutes or so and then take a break.
That break could be your pause.
Another nice one for today,
Number three,
Would be take a weekly reflection pause or what might be called a tech sabbath.
Either spend time journaling or meditating in that pause or just switch off tech totally,
Perhaps for a whole evening or a whole day.
See what comes up in you.
See how you feel after that and the difference it may make even to your memory potential.
Just recharge your soul.
And today we're going to end on a wonderful quote by Anne Lamott.
Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes,
Including you.
