Dulce Far Niente

Carol PlumridgeUseful information

Dulce Far Niente
Sweet Idleness

I was away on holiday with friends recently and I introduced them to the notion of Dulce Far Niente; the sweetness of doing nothing, sweet idleness. 

The phrase was made popular in the film Eat, Pray, Love. 

In the film one of the Italians was making the point to the Americans that they were always told that you have to ‘earn’ your leisure. You deserve to have a beer/treat/massage etc. We Italians (he said) just embrace relaxation, we need no reason for it other than the sweetness of the moment.

I am happy to report that my friends and I embraced the notion wholeheartedly. 

Can you remember the last time you truly relaxed? Felt that sweet peace that floods over you? Which feels very different to tiredness or boredom; they have a heavy/listless undertone of dissatisfaction. Relaxation is like melting, but not into a puddle. Similar to when ice cream starts to soften and you are flooded with well, sweetness. It does help to be warm and out of your normal surroundings. 

Why  is it so hard to achieve? 

We live in a left brain dominated world and it’s getting worse. Our left brain is organised, logical likes information, statistics and doesn’t like anything it is not familiar with. Look at how we weigh and measure ourselves constantly; aspiration, more, bigger, better, ambition. There is an app for everything so you can keep checking yourself, make sure that you are not slipping or failing. 

Who is the judge of all of this? 

The left side of our brain, it’s in its element, it’s also very judgemental. Is it any wonder that anxiety levels are through the roof? Our neocortex (new brain) is verbal; our reptilian brain isn’t – it just reacts. The amygdala (part of the reptilian brain) sends out fear signals; perfectly appropriate if you are confronted by a cobra. Fear makes you act, you run away from the cobra. What isn’t appropriate is your neocortex then telling you stories afterwards “that was close” “I could have died” which sets off the amygdala again and a cycle is set off which is anxiety. Anxiety doesn’t make you act it just makes you fret.
The right side of the brain makes connections, joins up the information that the left side presents, makes sense of everything. The right side sees the much bigger picture and taps into the part of us which is calm and peaceful constantly. Believe me it does exist but it’s often very deeply buried.
We are not encouraged to believe our sense of what is right or wrong for us at any given time. We need an app or an expert to tell us and there are plenty out there ready to do just that. Trying to live the way ‘experts’ tell us creates anxiety, because it probably goes against what you really want to do or be.
We are designed to live in a more in a right brained state, hence why peace and relaxation feel so good. But societally it’s not encouraged.
Have a look at Jill Bolte Taylor’s Ted Talk about her experience of a left sided stroke and what living in a more right brained way was like. It’s very interesting. 

Summer is here (sort of!) experiment with sweet relaxation, let yourself off the hook, the aspirations, the scary stories you tell yourself. 

You will feel amazing!