The Window
A window in a white village in the south of Spain, lit for your time of day. Stay as long as you like. Nothing needs doing.
A view through an open window with red geraniums on the sill, over a hillside of white houses with terracotta roofs, a church tower and a castle on a rock, and hills beyond.
Something to notice
Find the church tower.
Following your clock.
How it helps
Some things hold your attention without asking anything of it: light moving across a wall, birds turning in the sky, rain running down glass. Your mind gets to rest while your eyes stay interested.
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Look out
Let your eyes travel from the geraniums on the sill to the farthest hill, and back again.
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Notice one thing
Use the “something to notice” suggestions, or find your own small detail.
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Stay a while
There’s no end to this one. Leave when you’re ready, or come back at a different time of day.
Psychologists Rachel and Stephen Kaplan called this soft fascination. Their attention restoration theory suggests that gentle, interesting scenes let the part of your mind that concentrates have a rest. In a well-known 1984 study, Roger Ulrich found that hospital patients whose windows looked out on trees recovered a little faster than those facing a brick wall.
A drawn window is not the same as a real one, of course. If you can, look out of yours too.