In a world where “busy” is the new productive, “nothing time” feels counterintuitive and even a little shameful.

We regard idleness as a kind of failure, an indication that we’ve fallen short of some unspoken standard. But the truth is, idleness is essential to an active life. You might say that it’s the other half of good work.

Doing nothing is the hardest task for anyone who wants to get things done. In its basic form, doing nothing means not acting, just observing, thinking about your thinking, and pondering.

It’s a practice that might seem counterproductive at first. After all, active people are productive people, right? Wrong!

There’s a time and place for action, but there also needs to be a time and place where we stop doing things and give the brain a quality break it needs to restore, recover and make better connections.

That doesn’t make you any less productive — in fact, it makes you extremely productive by unlocking your natural energy and focus so you can get even more done afterwards with ease.

Doing nothing sounds like the kind of advice you hear from your grandparents when they visit — sit still, quiet your mind, and meditate on the meaning of life.

The funny thing is that this same advice applies to your everyday life whether or not your grandparents are around to give it to you.

Doing nothing isn’t as easy as it sounds though because our minds have been trained over many years to move from one thing to another — from task to task — without stopping for even a moment in between tasks.

It takes time to learn how to schedule “nothing” time. But making it a habit has life-changing benefits. And your productivity depends on it.