Much To Do About Nothing

 There is a northern European trend that is being used as a way to combat our increasingly busy and stressful lives: niksen. The Dutch concept is that simple — doing nothing.

What exactly is niksen?

Niksen literally means to do nothing, to be idle or do something without any use. Practicing niksen could be as simple as just hanging around, looking at your surroundings or listening to music — as long as it is without purpose and not done in order to achieve anything or be productive. Think “just sitting in a chair and looking out the window”.

While mindfulness is about being present and in the moment, niksen is more about carving out time to just be, letting your mind wander as opposed to focusing on the details of an action or activity.

We can have moments of relaxation which can be combined with easy, semiautomatic activity, such as knitting. Experts say that one aspect of the art of living is to find out what ways of relaxing fit you best. This should not be a one-size-fits-all approach. Through trial and error, you’ll discover which behaviors are most effective for you.

Niksen has been dismissed as laziness or anti-productive. But as stress levels climb in the U.S. and across the globe , and their crushing health impacts— like burnout- get more recognition from the medical sector, doing nothing is being framed more and more as a positive, stress-combating method.

Eve Ekman, director of training at the Greater Good Science Center at the University of California, Berkeley, says “everyone is looking for some way back to ease and connection”. As someone who studies stress and burnout, she calls the national levels of stress among adults and teens in the U.S. “daunting”.

Niksen does more than just make us feel relaxed. It can help us generate new ideas and even solve problems.

The research shows promise when it comes to the benefits of slowing down through activities such as spending time in nature. This practice comes with emotional perks, such as reducing anxiety and physical ones like strengthening the ability to fight off the common cold.

This should be enough to encourage us to consider practicing some niksen.