The Moments You Don't Fill

Lately I’ve been thinking about the tiny moments we usually rush past, the moments in between doing…

There is such rich opportunity in these moments.

Earlier this week, I woke in the early morning and took my toddler downstairs. I opened the window, heard the cat slip out, I felt the breeze on my skin and I listened.

Rain.

Soft air.

A faint battery-beep from the smoke alarm that made the quiet feel even quieter.

Being with my senses, I felt myself slow down. I came back to myself and felt my whole body exhale.  

It reminded me of a morning years ago when my daughter was a baby. We were up before the world, the house still asleep, and I wrote a poem about the sweep of her hair and the sounds of the house. I can still remember that moment, not because anything grand happened, but because I felt it in my senses. I was present, fully.

Both times were simple and ordinary and yet I felt them in my body as special and significant.

Connection before numbing.

Moments like this aren't just poetic, they are how we recalibrate. They change the way the whole day feels because they are moments of connection with yourself. A moment of noticing and experiencing life without any agenda or outcome to strive for.  

Presence before productivity.

A friend told me recently that she often scrolls in the “in-between” moments, you know the ones, waiting for a kettle to boil, a document to load, a meeting to start. We all do it. We fill the apparent void and then lose 20 minutes to meaningless distraction that you don’t even remember.

But the other day, instead of grabbing her phone, she looked up and watched two seagulls fighting over scraps. It wasn’t profound and it didn’t transform her life but it drew her in… she engaged with life, found herself amused and smiling. 

These are the tiny differences that matter.

Why?

These small pauses, the ones we usually try to fill, are where our nervous system recalibrates. They are the space in which ideas quietly form, where clarity arrives and where we reconnect to our sweet and shared humanity. 

We can step forward from these moments on purpose not just on autopilot.

So today, maybe see what happens if you leave just one little moment unfilled.

Let the kettle boil.

Let the browser load.

Wait in the queue.

Let the rain be rain.

Instead of distraction, drop into your senses; hear, see, feel, smell very, very simply.

Meet life in the smallest moments.

Helping you return to yourself in the smallest moments is the work I do.