How packed is your schedule today? We asked our listeners: "Do you think we've become too busy as a society?" Quite a few people responded, pretty much all saying yes.
Ally Bishop, from Easton, Pennsylvania, said, “I am insanely busy with work and volunteer commitments. I realized recently that it has to stop as it is taking a toll on my health. But how do you stop doing what society propels you to do? It will take much backbone to start saying no, even to the good opportunities and needs I'm asked to participate in.”
Tim Kreider is an author and cartoonist whose recent New York Times Opinionator article “The Busy Trap” has sparked this debate. He believes that the people who complain about being busy are not the ones who are straining their schedules out of necessity; rather, they are filling their lives up voluntarily. The author wonders what they might be trying to cover up.
"It's as if there's something we're trying to drown out with all this noise and frenetic activity," Kreider says. "I don't know if there's a name for what that thing is, but maybe we're all frightened of it. It might also be important. I worry that life has gotten so fast and busy that we have never paused to think about what it might be for."
From the sound of it, Bishop's life is all noise and frenetic activity. Even when she meditates, there is music playing, and even when she turns off the radio in the car, she is still on the way to some errand, commitment, or obligation. "My downtime is Saturday, and then it's usually downtime in the sense of running errands, picking things up, going to dinner, watching a movie, trying to actually spend time with my partner, and doing the things that you should be doing," Bishop says.
Kreider addresses this same idea of structured, planned downtime in his article, recalling that his requests to friends to hang out are met with hasty attempts to schedule in a bit of fun. "All other things being equal, I would genuinely rather be goofing off with my friends, and I don't get a chance to do that anymore, because everyone's so busy."
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The show is a co-production of WNYC Radio and Public Radio International, in collaboration with New York Times Radio and WGBH Boston.
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Comments [10]
Oh, BJG, where were you raised? Don't you know that Americans don't need to sleep, unlike some inferior people elsewhere? Love ("I love my job, I love my boss") make sleep unnecessary.
First and foremost it's imperative you read the original article which is being referred to http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/30/the-busy-trap/
Mr. Krieder nailed it when he says; "obviously your life cannot possibly be silly or trivial or meaningless if you are so busy, completely booked, in demand every hour of the day."
If Ms Bishop and or an immediate family member were to become seriously or terminally ill tomorrow - how quickly her busy schedule would cease to exist.
In that sense, he's also correct when he states; "I can't help but wonder whether all this histrionic exhaustion isn't a way of covering up the fact that most of what we do doesn't matter." People say it because it makes them feel important - I'm so busy therefore I must be someone.
When was the last time someone was to busy to attend a funeral? Everyone has time it's how they chose to spend it and with whom that speaks volumes. I'm so busy is the rudest euphemism for - I just don't have time for YOU! It solidifies exactly where you stand in someone's life - oh they have time and plenty of it - YOU'RE just not a priority.
Try it yourself ....
There are 365 days in a year. Subtract 8 hours for sleep and multiply 365 by 16. Leaving you with 5840 hours per year. Subtract work, commuting, eating, vacations and everything else you can conceivably think of and watch how much time you really do have.
It's like he says life is to short to be busy!! People take time for granted and what's really important in life.
domnogin,
The tragedy is that everyone collaborates. Very few of those who received their education under some desks (The Russians are coming, the Russians are coming; we are the best and the brightest) - all Americans - understand what's happening. Even fewer are courageous or foolish enough to protest (in any way - quitting, saying something, etc.) - the risk is just to great - losing one's job (obviously), health care, housing, being blacklisted for life, hearing the zombies left behind labeling you in unison "crazy, enemy of the people, etc."
I don't see a way out.
See the movie THE PRISONER OF SECOND AVENUE's final scene and the inherent conflict between the extended-hours managers and the 9-to-5 protagonist. Contrast it against HOUSE "5 to 9" where all the characters work sixteen-hour days, if not longer. The zones between work and not-work are blurred. We mocked the Soviets for their alleged eight-hour lines for basic supplies like in MOSCOW ON THE HUDSON; now some of us wait eight hours to vote in Ohio. Congratulations; we became our Cold War nemesis.
Way too busy. People shudder that we limit our son to one extracurricular activity at a time. But we spend much more time together as a family and have a closer relationship. I used to work in advertising and was told that I had to "step it up" because I rarely worked past mid-night and wasn't involved with enough community organizations that could boost business. But I saw people who were doing all that and they were stressed, unhappy and had bad home lives. There's something to be said for spending time with family and yourself. Now, I'm off to read a good book!
A very good article and an extremely important issue.
Several points.
Yes, this idiocy and barbarism go back to Puritanism (sorry that's true, not everything in Puritamism was idiotic and barbaric, but some aspects were -"the rich are because they deserve to be rich" is the most obvious one.
- I agree that this insane "business" is a cover for emptiness (what Tim said), but I would add that it's also avoidance of moral reflection. A doctor who following his bosses orders attached a 85 old year survivor of some absolute horror to a machine (to die this way and benefit his hospital) has a good reason to avoid a minute with himself. A Columbia professor who following the order of the Provost to suppress a nascent teaching assistant movement sent an e-mail condemning unions has a good reason to avoid a moment with herself. Of course, I can continue forever. Americans have emotional horror vacui and it isn't healthy. With a sad amusement I (an eternal non-conformist and dreamer) am forced now to visit my opportunistic friends in Bellevue who collapse one after another.
Maybe unauthentic life isn't worth living. Continue marching (sorry, I should have said running), friends. I have all the time to visit you.
This is one aspect of the present day American insanity and Tim seems to understand that there is a difference between people dying from exhaustion (so this or that CEO could amass more billions) and this "business" of the privileged, guilty and primitive.
The inhuman exploitation and dehumanization is another issue which should be addressed. BTW, these to issues are linked. "Busy" because they are sick and come to non-profits as volunteers do take other peoples jobs contribute to the exploitation of those HAVE to work. Of course, the issue is much bigger and there countless aspects. I am just hinting.
turned off TTA soon after hearing this segment.
i mean really . . . who cares?
I'm not sure if this is good or bad for my well being, but I'm the type of person that has to keep busy. If I am not doing something, especially engaging, I will become sluggish and bored.
Maybe that is why I love teaching art to middle school boys.
"Of course, no time. But how can you have time if you don't take time?" The Merovingian,'The Matrix'.
The way to avoid business is to pray, or to pray while working. A bishop said to Mother Teresa that he had so many responsibilities he was finding it hard to find time for an hour of Adoration a day.
Mother Teresa said that if he had that many important responsibilities, he should do two hours of Adoration a day.
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