F**k "Type A"

I took the tests in Cosmo and Working Woman - "16 Signs You Might Be Type A".  My score always rocked the charts.  Are you driven? Impatient? High Stress? Yes, yes, yes. Do you get things done?   Yes!   I wore my scarlet Type A like a badge of honor.

Writing speeches on  luncheon napkins minutes before I was to address the audience.  I never met a crisis I couldn't handle.  All that stress was 99.9% self inflicted.  There was no boss or  company requiring long hours or demanding performance, only me.  My best New Year's Resolution one year was a new mantra - "My resolution this year is to not take on any more projects".  I used that line well into December.

My family tried interventions.  My father-in-law gently broached the subject, "Sometimes, you only need what makes you happy." and my own dad saying "You don't have to be a millionaire to live like a millionaire."  Both are true.  It's not a sellout to  s l o w   d o w n.  But why does it feel like a "sell out"?

Lately, I have been practicing Bikrim Yoga.  Twenty-six poses at 104 degrees while focusing on little more than your breath.  Meditation has always been a challenge for my racing mind.  Now, I have the time to  s l o w  down and only push myself to meditate, stretch and breath for 90 minutes.  How things have changed in this encore phase of life.  And how liberating, fuck Type A!

Remember Happy Times

According to the Harvard Study on happiness, “multi-tasking is the enemy of savoring”.  My next challenge towards happiness was to “Savor the Pleasure”.  Placing my attention on pleasure and enjoying each experience in the moment as it occurs.  This happiness philosophy is the subject of Eckhart Tolle’s NYT bestselling book “The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment”.   It is no surprise that Oprah Winfrey recommended the tome with its promises of new consciousness and enlightenment.  I found out this week that I really suck at the Power of Now. 

Pilots are natural multi-taskers.  This is when I came to the realization that ADD does have benefits.  When flying you need to look out the windshield, monitor your instruments, physically fly the plane with feet on rudders and hands on throttle and yoke (in the old days) while talking to the tower on the radio.   For this reason, I see no distracting danger when I shift my car while I talk on the (wireless) phone.  I manage best with several balls in the air, and easily get bored focusing on one task at a time. 

I started on Monday morning with my sincere attempt to savor each task and  “recognize and enjoy pleasures in my day” as the Study recommended.   I bombed from the start by reading the newspaper, while drinking coffee with the morning news on in the background.  I could not stop myself from checking e-mails and sending a few texts.  Single-tasking was an impossible mission.  Things got better when I read my daily meditation without distractions and took the dog for a walk and purposely left my phone at home.  But I could not take a run without my I-pod music giving me encouragement.  The more I tried to limit my attention to one thing the more stressed out I became, not exactly my definition of “happiness”.  That evening I was able to focus on our hour-long yoga session, but not without my mind wandering a few times.  The value of inner stillness is no more evident than in the practice of yoga. 

The premise of living in the moment is to not to regret the past or fear the future, but to enjoy the present.  But savoring can also mean fondly remembering earlier happy events, like I did this week when I watched a few home videos.  And daydreaming about returning to Europe this summer with the girls gave me joyful anticipation about the future. 

While I failed miserably at the goal of single-tasking, I think I succeeded in appreciating every day’s special moments.