I've always been hyper and high-strung so when I heard about an entire weekend of sitting still at a Buddhist temple, I considered the $80 price tag a bargain. There was only one little hitch; it's really really tough for me to sit still.

As I sat in the temple with about 100 other sitting stillers, I was bored. I made lists in my head--what I needed to buy, what I needed to do, who I needed to call.

Then I looked at my watch and figured a couple of hours had passed. Six minutes had gone by! Six! No wonder when you were bad in school the teacher made you go sit in a corner! This stunk! So I left.

On the drive home I realized I had just paid $80 to sit for six minutes. But to me that was a better deal than spending $80 to sit for seven minutes.

I began plotting my day--I'd grab lunch at the Kebab Palace, get my car washed, watch baseball--and I felt superior to the temple people who were all wasting their time--not moving, not thinking, not eating kebabs.

But as I sat at the car wash yapping on my cell phone while flipping through air-fresheners, I kinda wished I was still sitting still. Because my mind DID need a break. The paradox is, until you put your brain on pause, you won't realize how much it needed the vacation.

So now when I have to sit still and wait--for a doctor, or haircut, I just tack the time on to the six minutes from my sitting still weekend--I'm almost up to an hour now.