Picture this: You’ve had a long day at work and looking forward to a relaxing evening. You start streaming an episode of your favorite series. Two hours later you’re still there, and now you’re frustrated that you didn’t use that time more effectively. It’s not that you wanted to do work tasks or take care of personal stuff... you just wanted more out of that precious time that would renew your body, mind, and soul.

I love it when I hear or read something that challenges my current perspective. A few weeks ago I was truly shaken when James Clear, in his powerful book, Atomic Habits, wrote:

"You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems."

In our activity-obsessed culture, the idea of doing nothing is not considered a positive thing to do. Oh we talk about relaxing and disengaging, but even those moments of idleness are incessantly interrupted by the ding, chirp, or ring of an electronic device. The tide is changing, however, and there is now mounting evidence that we need these moments of what I call "sacred idleness. Forbes had an excellent article on the subject just a few months ago.  I've taught the general benefits of taking an "intermission" in my work life balance training for several years, and am always looking for more neurologically-based facts to support the value of doing nothing.

At the 2004 Olympics in Athens, USA rifle shooter Matt Emmons was poised to win his second gold medal. He had one shot left, and only needed a score of 7.3. The lowest score on his last nine shots was 9.3, so the gold was certainly to be in his hands soon. Sure enough, Emmons took the shot, and hit a bullseye... on the wrong target. He was awarded 0 points and finished fourth in this particular competition.

Dan Roth, the executive editor at LinkedIn, sent an email inviting people on Linked In to write a post with the theme of "If I Were 22" as a message to college graduates. I smiled, because every year about this time I get more reflective about where my life journey has taken me. I was even given the chance to share my thoughts as the student commencement speaker at North Carolina State University (see picture above) way back in 1989. I often think about what I would do differently if I were starting my professional career again-or what choices I am thrilled that I made. So in honor of all the "22ish" college graduates (wanted to include those on the 6 year plan), here are my 22 reflections from that Linked In article: