Everyday Mindfulness

TEXTING OR NEXTING

One day I was sitting in a traffic jam in a city in the UK, which let me tell you is a common thing in my country, when I noticed to my left on the pavement a woman walking along and texting.

Nothing wrong with this of course, and there is no judgement here of the woman, as most of us do this, but what I also noticed is that she was leaning forward and rushing. Which again most of us do.

Walking and texting is quite a common sight in most countries nowadays and may not be a cause for concern. However, maybe because I had nothing else to do but I started to ponder on this. It was not the texting that was most remarkable thing but the fact that she seemed to be leaning forwards, almost leaning forward into the future.


I pondered the word texting, a strange word when you repeat it to yourself. But then the word nexting came to mind. Not only do we spend time texting, but also nexting.

This means our attention is rarely in the here and now but what is coming next…we can be so easily lost in the future. I think most of us spend most of our time nexting. Next implies the future, that which is to come, but not here yet. If you pay attention and are honest with yourself you will notice that most of the time you are nexting. When we are not then often we may be lost in the past.

I don’t mean that texting is wrong or bad or anything like that. What I mean is that a lot of our activities are done because we are incapable of being in the present. We are slaves to doing.

Many people come to me about the cause of stress and I must say the cause is very simple.

We have too many thoughts in our heads telling us all sorts of things need doing. These thoughts are constantly pulling us out of the present moment. If you don’t believe follow the short exercise at the end of this anecdote.

One of the exercises I give to my students on the courses I run is to notice during the day when you are lost in nexting. Then I ask them to bring their mind back into the present moment to whatever they are doing in the here and now.

A lot of them are surprised at just how much they live not only in their heads, which is where it appears that thinking takes place, but in their thoughts about the future and the past.

Exercise:
Put down this book and sit quietly with eyes either open or closed. Now just sit and don’t do anything. Don’t text, don’t read, no need to plan, no need to reflect on anything at all. Just sit and observe what happens. Be honest with yourself. Notice after a while the urge to think about something, anything but just being here and now in the simplicity of this moment.

Observe the thoughts, feel the impulses and urges to get up and do something. See if you can do this for the first 10 minutes

I am running a FREE webinar called HELP I CAN'T STOP THINKING! on Monday 31st July 7pm - 8pm. If you cannot make it registration gives you access to the recording.
https://app.webinarjam.net/register/36719/4a30c901be

Thanks a lot. Great term 'NEXTING'

So true!! I think the same could be said for when people are on social media (Facebook / Twitter / Instagram / Etc.). More often than not, we are not in the present moment when browsing social media. We are usually getting caught up in other peoples lives instead of living our own...I am guilty of this myself! We need to teach ourselves to put down our phones once in a while.

Yes, absolutely. I have a regular cycle of managing to feel grounded and present and able to roll with what's happening for a few days and then getting very caught up in plans for the future, frustration and impatience, desire to change myself, feeling negative about myself for not already getting wherever it is I've decided I should be, researching a lot of self help techniques to try to push away those feelings and improve myself etc. (many of which masquerade as mindfulness).

The whole thing plays out over and over and at some point I realise that all I need to do is stop, just stop and be still and know that nothing needs to change, that I don't need to change. But it's very hard to do that when I'm pushing onwards all the time and convinced of the importance of that.

I also find myself standing with my weight on my toes, leaning into what I'm doing, the outcome, the next thing. And breathing high up in my chest, or hardly at all. It's as if I fear that once I stop that striving, exerting that control, things will fall apart, or I will drop into sadness or overwhelming tiredness, or some other state that I Don't Want! But if I do let go, breathe, let my weight sink, stop, it's the most easeful thing in the world, regardless of what emotions are there.