Doing nothing for ten minutes is harder than doing something for an hour. Try it once.

Stillness is uncomfortable because nothing arrives to occupy you. An hour of activity gives your attention somewhere to go every few seconds, and ten minutes of nothing hands it straight back to you, along with whatever you have been outrunning. That is why people reach for the phone in an elevator. It is not boredom exactly, it is the absence of a distraction.

Sit somewhere for ten minutes this week with nothing to look at. You do not have to be calm or clear your head, just stay. Most people find the first three minutes unbearable and the last three oddly steady, and that shift is the whole exercise.