The Busy Trap

Hello, Neatoramanauts! Howyadoin'? If you answer "busy" or better yet, "craaazy busy" then welcome to modern life. You're not alone. Most of Americans in the 21st century live in the perpetual state of "busy"-ness.

And that, argues, Tim Kreider, author of We Learn Nothing, is actually trap.

I know, I know. You're busy, but trust me. Take a moment from your busy schedule and read the Busy Trap:

It is, pretty obviously, a boast disguised as a complaint. And the stock response is a kind of congratulation: “That’s a good problem to have,” or “Better than the opposite.”

Notice it isn’t generally people pulling back-to-back shifts in the I.C.U. or commuting by bus to three minimum-wage jobs who tell you how busy they are; what those people are is not busy but tired. Exhausted. Dead on their feet. It’s almost always people whose lamented busyness is purely self-imposed: work and obligations they’ve taken on voluntarily, classes and activities they’ve “encouraged” their kids to participate in. They’re busy because of their own ambition or drive or anxiety, because they’re addicted to busyness and dread what they might have to face in its absence.

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Shocking as it is, I really ENJOY my work and the projects I create for myself. I often see friends, but I also often make excuses not to see friends because I just WANT to stay home and work.

I think THAT's my key to a good life. Instead of supposedly filling life with busy, fill life with the kind of busy that you actually like.

Besides, we can't all get by living in New York working 4 or 5 hours a day going out to coffee shops all the time like the author of this silly article...
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I know quite a few people who have dug themselves into The Busy Trap. I look at the situation a bit differently. For something new to come into our lives, we have to have time for it. If we want our lives to improve, we must arrange for large chunks of unstructured, uncommitted time.
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