WHAT DO YOU NOTICE?
What can we learn from micro-moments of pause?
I saw a guy coloring the chewing gum stuck on the pavement yesterday, and it gathered quite a crowd. He does that all the time, and has even gone viral.
At first, I thought people gathered around someone who had fallen down with his bag and colors scattered around him. But no, he was ok. My friend saw me wonder and worry and said, “It’s the chewing gum man.”
He was sitting on the ground, filling in the chewing gum patches with colors, names, drawings, and other little images that would spark someone to pause and look closer.
And you had to look closer to see it. It made me think about how rarely we pause to notice the small things, and yet it’s the small stuff that makes us smile, isn’t it? It’s the small moments that create connection. It’s the small acts of generosity that make us feel we matter. And yet, it’s easy to miss the small moments, especially at work, where we tend to chase the big events and wonders, thinking that bigger and more is better than small and precise.
WHAT DO YOU NOTICE?
What do you notice and pay attention to? Do you celebrate the small steps? Do you pause to acknowledge yourself or someone else for caring? Or do you think of success as the end result?
Having spent many years designing and building retail environments in one of my many lives on this path called career growth, I know the value of pausing to pay attention to the small stuff, the small efforts, and the small micro-moments that can either break or make a relationship. When we rush, we miss mistakes that could be avoided and cues that could build connection, and yet we have a culture that values speed as the key to effectiveness and productivity.
VALUES DIRECT OUR ATTENTION.
What do we value and care about? Getting it done or doing something that matters or that makes a difference?
If you think about it, what drives you might surprise you. When you are just focusing on getting it done, you are focused on the end goal, and you might not pause to ask more questions about what it's for, if this is the best way to get done, and what you need to do to achieve the results you aim for. It tends to become a rush to finish, and with that, stress builds, especially if your mindset is stuck in the fear of what you might not be doing right.
When you are focusing on doing something that matters, it’s about others and the impact your actions, choices, and work have. When we consider how we achieve the results, we look for small cues that build a better result because curiosity and care, not fear, drive the process. We pause to listen and ask more questions, and we become more inclusive of other's ideas and perspectives because we are focused on the best result for everyone, not just for ourselves.
WHAT MATTERS?
I don’t think the guy on the bridge thought about what he was going to achieve for himself by crunching down on a cold day to color in chewing gum patches. I think he thought about creating small moments that make us pause, notice, and smile as we discover something new. Maybe it’s the modern-day urban version of stopping to smell the roses. We tend to miss too much and then feel stuck on the hamster wheel, without inspiration and motivation, just doing what we always do all day long.
Could we pause more to notice, ask more questions, and learn more along the way? It might spark some new ideas and better solutions. As I kept walking, I saw patches of colorful chewing gum along the bridge instead of dark, ugly ones that just made the pavement look dirty. There are many ways to solve a problem if we simply rethink what the solution serves. Our own needs or that of others. Most solutions that matter always include other people. That’s why the self-care mindset is not about self; it’s about unlocking what we care about.
