So yesterday at Rally (Rally!), I was reflecting on my mysterious project.
And here’s part of a train of discoveries from the rabbit holes:
Puppies!
Apparently puppies sleep 90% of the day. For the first few weeks of being alive.
NINETY PERCENT OF THE DAY.
Sleeping.
Cuteness!
That seems like a really good plan.
In fact, it seems like that much hiding, shelter and processing would also be good for any tiny sweet thing.
For any Gwish.
For anything you really care about.
Pause, pause, and then more pausing. Paws!
So then I tried to ignore it.
In the afternoon my body wanted to nap.
But I was having so much fun playing with my project and hanging out with it that I couldn’t bear to go to sleep.
I said, How about we interview Slightly Future Me about the project instead?
Slightly Future Me gave me two useful pieces of information.
And I’ll tell you the second one:
Puppies are smarter than you.
She was right.
So I slept on it.
I planted the thing I wanted to know about my project into the nap and decided to fractal flower it by sleeping.
Then I woke up and did some old Turkish lady yoga, and then about six different outrageous shivanautical epiphanies made themselves known to me.
Which I can’t describe yet.
Being that intensely alive requires a lot of prep time.
Puppies are smarter than I am. They are also more trusting about sleep than I am.
These are related.
Ninety percent of the time.
That’s a lot.
That’s how much I could dedicate to the hidden parts — the processing and recovery and entry. And it would be a valuable investment of time too.
You know what else puppies are good for?
Enthusiasm.
Play.
Joyous fidgeting and exploratory movements!
Snuggling.
Slow sleepy breathing.
Puppies live yoga.
You can’t hurry a puppy.
So why do I try to hurry my deepest wishes and desires?
They’re just doing their ninety-percenting so they can play when they’re ready.
Play! And the giant commenting blanket fort.
Tragically, I do not have any puppy photos for this post.
You can help. Possibly.
The public needs adorable puppy pictures! Share.
Schmoo schmoo schmoo! Puppies!
Other than that, we can play with the concepts here in whatever way we want.
As always, we all have our stuff. We’re all working on our stuff.
Each of us is in charge of our own experience with this. We avoid giving each other unsolicited advice. We’re supportive and welcoming!
That’s it. Love to the commenter mice, the Beloved Lurkers and everyone who reads.
Follow
Omg, Havi, I love this post! Thanks:)
http://philadelphia.craigslist.org/pet/2712284144.html <- <3
I love to watch puppies sleep. And dream… <3
Puppy photos! Here’s a picture of my (now 100 lb) mutt when he was a little guy.
I have no puppy pictures, but I humbly offer this instead:
http://goo.gl/bUuv6
After all, cats also understand the value of napping 🙂
I hadn’t been to the blog lately and just today I took a peek.
I’ve been insomniac for a week and half. An overactive mind is to blame. I hear songs, bits of conversation, bits of my to-do list, with bits of worry, movie scenes, quotes, projects… all of it throwing a party the moment I touch the pillow.
This post is just what I needed. It’s so true:
“So why do I try to hurry my deepest wishes and desires?
They’re just doing their ninety-percenting so they can play when they’re ready. ”
So thank you for figuring this out and on top of everything, using a puppy as an example.
For puppy photos, try cuteoverload. That’s my sunday night ritual.
Ha! Yay for puppies! Here’s a pic of my own sweet baby when he was new… http://fairbettysworld.blogspot.com/2009/02/this-is-newest-addition-to-kauffman.html
I am a HYOOOGE fan of dailypuppy.com – and their app. And I of course have my own puppy, but she’s an old puppy now. Here’s a link to her Flickr set:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/risa/sets/336751/
Also, NINETY PERCENT is now going to be a touchphrase in my heads. Loads of quiet and rest! What a lovely realization! I feel much better 🙂
The great thing about puppies, unlike us adults who live in our heads so much, is that they will sleep ANYWHERE. If a puppy needs sleep time, they will take it… at the park, at puppy school, in the car, at grandma’s house… when they need it, they take it.
Here’s a photo to add to the collection of my schmupalup back when she was tiny.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/alyssssyla/6390086411/in/set-72157600013703993/
Oh my gosh! Yay!
Yesterday I was having coffee with a friend and talking about how the more you sleep the better you’ll be at doing your thing. He kept getting distracted from our conversation because a woman behind me had a tiny puppy cuddled up in her jacket! And the tiny puppy did go to sleep in the noisy coffee shop, with just his little head peaking out of the top of her jacket. Adorableness!
I’m going to go to sleep right now!
What. A. Fabulous. Image. Puppies!
Oh wow – I love it.
For the past two days I wanted to hide out and be quiet and not necessarily ‘do’ stuff, so I’ve tried to step back and allow hiding, quiet time. And to practice trusting myself. Then this morning I woke up knowing exactly what the next thing I needed to do was. And did it.
There wasn’t any napping (too revolutionary!) but I think maybe there was some ninety-percenting time in there… This is the first, proper evidence of anything like this *working* so the cuddly scientists are making notes like mad right now.
My mother breeds golden retrievers. One of her dogs had a litter yesterday – 3 boys and 3 girls. My name is linked to her web site. The cuteness of the pictures all over the site is off the scale!
And you’re right, they DO sleep 90% of the time, and they twitch while they do because their muscles are still developing. I love this post. I am generally a lurker but I love the 90% concept too much to keep lurking!
Visit the site. Check out the puppies. Bask in the adorableness. 🙂
the title scared me for a moment…what if there was truly a shortage of puppies photos int eh world? Or even worse, cat videos??? The humanity!
but I’m kind of hoping someone can post the smell of puppies!
I am, I regret, puppiless. However, I do have a nifty blog post in which I recently suggested that we deal with November by going back to bed.
http://thepracticaldilettante.com/2011/11/15/luxuriate-in-november/
Also, at lunchtime, my husband and I were discussing hot buttered epiphanies, and we were trying to think of foods which would not be improved by hot butter. We didn’t come up with any (although sometimes we added other ingredients.) We like the idea, if you can’t already tell!
haha, “puppies are smarter than you.” I read this post after taking a nap that I wasn’t feeling entirely un-guilty about. Good timing, Havi!
I slept all afternoon! Yay! Thank you!
Also: http://www.dogasaur.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/superhero-poodle.jpg
“So why do I try to hurry my deepest wishes and desires?”
oh my, I started crying when I read this.
Brace yourself:
http://tinyurl.com/7vem37c
Akita puppies! Not that I’m biased or anything. But don’t they look like something that FAO Schwartz would sell?
Of course then there’s this…
http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=sleeping+puppies+pictures&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8
I think I will follow that example.
One of the local shelters has a satellite office near our house and we visit regularly just to hold the puppies. All is right with the world when you’re holding a happy, warm, snuggly, sleepy puppy. And, on that note, two cute puppy pics:
http://pixdaus.com/single.php?id=101575
http://30.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lutpveQg8K1qjxja8o1_500.jpg
Beau is middle-aged, but he still naps 90% of the day. And he’s the most productive person I know (in that he does EXACTLY what he wants to do, every day):
http://www.flickr.com/photos/blondechicken/6345376428/in/photostream
http://www.flickr.com/photos/blondechicken/5593215971/in/photostream
Here’s one. This puppy is teaching me a lot.
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-aMQseknBg8c/TotIf-67IoI/AAAAAAAAJh0/qp8EBn6WEds/s288/IMAG0016.jpg
Dachsund puppy! SWOON xxxxooo more kisses: http://mylifemylaughsmyloves.blogspot.com/2011/09/my-laughs-itching.html
And I guess you know about the NPR segment on the Puppy Channel? http://www.thepuppychannel.com/archives/nprs-this-american-life-radio-show-featured-us-again-this-season/. It features what may be the most memorable theme song ever, which goes: “Puppies-puppies, puppies-puppies, puppies. Puppies!”
I love puppies! I don’t have one, although we talk about it sometimes and then we worry that the cat might hide under a piece of furniture and never come out again (she’s easily traumatized by new experiences or beings, whether animal or human… she’s okay about bugs, though.)
“You can’t hurry a puppy. So why do I try to hurry my deepest wishes and desires?”
Thank you for this. For this whole post.
OMG. Best $.99 I have spent on my iPhone is “Puppytime.” Three times a day it barks and sends you a new pic of a puppy!
So far the best part is how often I forget to turn the sound off and it barks during external work meetings. So then I have to explain it to whomever I am meeting with. Watching serious “grown-ups” in suits laughing about puppy time and talking about how cute puppies are is an excellent break in my workday!!! 🙂
P.S. napping is almost always a good idea, IMHO
It’s highly possible if your post were full of puppy photos, I might have missed the point. Because Puppies!!!!!
🙂