Do you ever think back to twenty, ten, or even five, years ago and wonder what you used to do with all that extra time? Before you spent time on Facebook or tweeting, when the only one to take care of was you?
My husband has been slogging away in his first grad school semester and has finished his final, and is now back in the land of the living. (It was a tough few months being an accounting widow, let me tell you!). So this weekend felt a bit like we were ‘off the clock’.
I haven’t really touched my computer all weekend. I entered hardly any contests, which for me is highly unusual (see here for further details on how I spend 45 minutes a day to upgrade my lifestyle to something vastly beyond my salary). What did we do with two glorious days of no work and no real commitments?
I took Kate to dance class. We had a group nap (though the baby was in her crib, it was group in spirit!). We had friends over for dinner, went swimming and went to the park. I read my new magazine and a few chapters of my book. And I’m coming into Sunday night feeling more awake and aware and content than I have in months.
And then I had an ‘aha’ moment – THIS is what I used to do. And it didn’t become 
impossible from any outside factors – my time use changed. We have the same number of hours in the day as Leonardo da Vinci, Einstein, Joss Whedon, Mercedes Lackey, Oprah, L.M. Montgomery, and a number of others famed for genius in past and present. It isn’t about how much time we do or don’t have. It’s about the choices we make when we’re using it. It’s about choosing to read a few more pages instead of skimming Facebook. Writing in your journal instead of playing a new video game. Of saying ‘yes’ when the baby wants to go outside and dig in the yard for the third time that day, and spending some time just watching her wander from one end of the tiny yard to the other, waving her spoon in the air. She couldn’t care less about the news online – there are dandelions to pick!
Let’s all spend a bit more time playing board games, making cookies and connecting with our friends and family and a bit less time mindlessly zoning out on our i-Things. It will make the world a nicer place.
How could you use your time differently? What are you focused on right now?
My evening recharge is to lie on the couch, eating dinner and watching TV with the dog asleep against my legs. I’m not one of those people who watches a lot of TV these days and I’m certainly not encouraging anyone to get suckered into that trap, but I do think it’s the combination of food, some mental quiet time and a cuddly puppy squashed up against me that actually creates the recharge factor. When I’m trying to be “productive” I’ll eat dinner at my computer desk browsing the web for things that initially seem important but aren’t really and it’s not nearly as effective as down time. Maybe it’s just that I spend all day at work on the computer that, what I really need when I get home, is to be as far away from it for an hour as possible.
Hey Sunshine!
You’re so right about the recharge time. I know one of the things that makes keeping up with my blog difficult is if I sit on it every day. I try to take every other day as a “blog free” day, I will answer comments in passing but other than that, I have nothing to do with it. It makes it way easier to come back to feeling refreshed.
Cheers
Lindsey
Well, I could spend a lot less time on FB Scrabble. I am addicted and I realize it takes me out of myself, makes me think, organize, strategize – all the things I used to do before I retired. I love being retired but I should, I really, really should think about activities I can do in the evening. See I am focussed right now on replying to your blog with one eye on all my Scrabble games.