A quote I uploaded yesterday that I’ve been thinking about a lot:
“Because work has temporal structure, we unconsciously associate leisure with temporal disorganization. And over this deadening rhythm is played, again and again, the same psychological bolero: Monday, the Day of Wrath; Tuesday and Wednesday, the grind; weary Thursday, across whose fallowness Friday, a prostitute-goddess of inexplicably renewable freshness, beckons with a promise of unspecified fulfillment. This promise is based on the lie that human nature, unfulfilled by work, can be fulfilled by leisure. Of course the promise is never kept; we spend Saturday and Sunday consecrating the week’s successes and failures to oblivion, in deepening dread of the Monday to come.”
Robert Grudin, Time And The Art Of Living
I hadn’t really thought about it like this before, but I do feel this strange urge to be anti-temporal-structure when off work.
I still usually get done main priorities (i.e. workout, chores, errands, etc)—but definitely in a more disorderly way. I usually sleep in later… Am on my phone longer… Give into cravings more…
And while it’s true that it’s precisely this that gives leisure time at least some of its pleasure, I oftentimes feel like I finish those same days feeling less good about the day overall… Like it was mostly wasted…
And while, yes, we need this temporal disorganization space as a sort of Yin to the Yang of work, I also think we need to be more mindful than ever of what we’re choosing to do during “disorganized time…” Are we passive-entertainment-binging or casually reading? Are we TikTok-ing or hobbying? Are we actively living or screen vegetating?
Something to think about…