Is Wasting Time Truly Wasting It?
A philosophical perspective on how to spend time & the perils of the productivity trap
For most people my age, we’ve all been inculcated into the habit that ‘time’ is something to be maximised for output and productivity. Chances are, if you were born & raised around or before that, you’d have the same notions about spending your time.
I’ve been on both sides of the spectrum, i.e. aiming to be highly productive whilst on the other hand, “wasting time” & doing as I please. But in trying to view time as a resource to be maximised, are we losing the essence of what it means to live life?
As I wrote in an earlier piece on this newsletter:
“We’ve built a world that operates on extractivism: the idea that we must extract the most out of our time, where more is always better, and that anything that doesn’t produce immediate results is a failure.”
I’ve seen both sides of the coin. Until a year or so ago, when I wasn’t fully aware of how to balance my time, I kept productivity at the top of my to-do list when I looked at how to spend my time.
I’d organise my day & schedule it into time slots for everything. If I didn’t manage to do exactly as per my schedule, which happens to most people quite often, it left me wanting & feeling down.
In the midst of all the relentless to-do tasks created to maximise & squeeze every ounce of time into goals, targets & activities, I became more anxious, was left feeling unfulfilled, and I’d criticise myself & feel bad for the moments when I did take my foot off the pedal.
It became a battle of me vs myself & I was almost always losing.
If I spent time watching a movie or listening to music, or scrolling on my phone, or just looking out of the window having a smoke as music played, I’d feel bad thinking that I was wasting my time by not being productive.
If I didn’t crank through my work tasks or practice my instruments as per schedule, I’d be hard on myself & put myself down, calling myself a “failure” & the near-constant negative feelings stemming out of my lack of “productivity” kept eating away at me.
That’s when I decided to read & learn more about people who felt the same way as me & this appalling fallacy. People who suggested that my “time wasting” was, in fact, a human reaction that’s unavoidable and that hints at the need to slow down.
I did some digging & unearthed several concepts starting with Oliver Burkeman’s book Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals wherein he suggests that procrastination isn’t an evil but a natural human tendency & behaviour & that family & quality personal time are what matter the most in the context of our 4000 weeks — which is the average human lifespan (it formed the basis of the first chapter of my book Make Your Own Waves as well).
We’ve been raised to think that procrastination is evil, but it is, in fact, a natural, unavoidable human tendency. And time management is all life is, except we trade it in for productivity & in search of money, forgetting how brief our time living is.
Back then, even on a vacation, I found myself trying to “hoard” time. I booked an AirBnb at a pristine valley-facing location, but when I stared out into the vast valley and surrounding hills in the lovely monsoon weather, I found myself wanting to keep those moments going longer & longer because I wouldn’t be in the same place after a few days.
In essence, I wasn’t being totally present.
Insted of being completely present in the moment & enjoying the view & my brief vacation, I was trying to “hoard” time to extend it.
As another writer named Stephan Joppich writes in his post on Medium:
“I remember one evening when I stood on a mountaintop, looked down into the valley below me, and watched the most beautiful sunset unfold. Streaks of orange and purple pierced the clouds. A warm breeze caressed my cheeks. Crickets chirped in the distance. The scent of lavender.”
“What I recall most from that moment, though, is how intensely I tried to bottle it all up. I was overly aware of how quickly this moment would pass. I didn’t want to waste it. I wanted to enjoy it, savor it, make it last, make it last, make it last. Paradoxically, whenever I tried to alchemize time into fulfillment, what I gained instead was restlessness, worthlessness, and anxiety.”
I wasn’t managing my time. Time was managing me.”
As Joppich further elaborates in his post:
“Slouchy activities infused me with regret because I wasn’t feeling productive. Meanwhile, productive activities infused me with anxiety because nothing felt good enough. I was constantly striving toward a future state: a goal, a milestone, a feeling of bliss. And yet, in the rare moments I actually attained these states, the sand grains of satisfaction slipped right through my fingers.”
“The irony was almost comical. The more I thought about having wasted time, the more I lived in the past. Conversely, the more I thought about not wasting time, the more I lived in the future. The irony is, of course, that I never arrived in the present.”
All this need for productivity & cranking in work tasks to make a little more money left me exasperated & constantly in the shadows of wanting more as well.
But after enough time, I realised that all these self-imposed feelings of inadequacy stemmed from me trying to maximise my time instead of acknowledging its natural flow & the rhythms of my mind & body & being fully and totally present in the moment.
The thing is, it’s perfectly fine to procrastinate and do seemingly “wasteful” activities & there’s no need for constant productivity.
Yes, there are certain tasks to be done during the day, but you can also do it at your own pace & in your own way. This is life. Not a race to a finish line. And slow, gradual progress is also progress.
I’ve learnt to acknowledge that on some days, I’ll spend more time doing seemingly pointless activities like listening to music, binge watching a movie or TV show, or just scrolling on my phone. Also, in playing my instruments when I feel like, producing music when I want to and writing here on Substack or wherever else when I get an idea, creative spark or feel the need to write, gives me more impetus when they aren’t planned.
The key thing is balance. I have a few tasks that are imperative & need to be done, but otherwise I like to keep my schedule open for inspiration & creativity to sink in so that I can do my best work.
When I’m not working, doing my job as a football journalist, there’s ample time & space for me to work on projects that are meaningful to me, at my own pace, without feeling overwhelmed by the gauntlet of being productive & maximising my time.
Some days are more productive than others, other days I barely get enough done but the key thing to realise is that you’re not “wasting” time, you’re “living” it.
Quoting Tyler Durden from Fight Club: “This is your life, and it’s ending one minute at a time.”
Even the recent tragic incident of the air crash of the Air India plane in Ahmedabad further just strengthens the argument that life is so unpredictable, and that we need to live out our lives to the max, and not strive to maximise our time to be productive & consequently beat ourselves up about spending our time, our way.
While Joppich sort of radically talks about “intentionally wasting time” in his piece, my take is more about balance & acknowledging the brief time frame of a lifetime.
There’s this quote by Bob Dylan on success as well, where he says, “A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and gets to bed at night, and in between he does what he wants to do.”
And that couldn’t be more true.
Ultimately, you can’t avoid your responsibilities — the need to function within the system as society is designed & circumstance as well, after all, food needs to be put on the table & other responsibilities are important.
But it’s about acknowledging that life is brief. And that balance in your daily activities & routines without beating yourself up over squandering time is pretty essential.
It’s perfectly ok to go slow & take your time & spend time doing seemingly unproductive activities. In the end, it’s the richness of our days that matters most in the context of a lifetime, not productivity.
Time is something meant to be lived out; something to be experienced wholly and in the present. Not something that keeps you in the shadows.
Time wasting isn’t really wasted time; it’s you living your life.
It’s an art of living & mastering in itself.
So the next time you find yourself beating yourself up about your lack of productivity, think again, relax, take a breath, and embrace the pauses, understand that this is a natural human tendency, and try to live wholly present in the moment —it’s where life truly unfolds.
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