Busy doing nothin'

Setting the sliders, life in balance time. If I'm to set the slider between 'activity' and 'inactivity', it will have to be right across to the 'activity' end.

I hate doing nothing. I feel pangs of guilt if I've not had a productive day. Being lazy is not an option in life. Yes, rest if you need rest - sleep is extremely important (I slept nine hours last night, from 22:15 to 07:15, waking naturally this morning). Take time off to recover, to unwind, to relax - but do so consciously. Drifting off into hours or days or weeks or months or years or a lifetime of being unproductive is dreadful - it is nothing less than the denial of one's human potential. Especially if one drifts off into such a useless state without even noticing it.

While I am harsh on myself for wasting time in idleness, my definition of 'productive time' is small-c catholic and small-l liberal. Reading, thinking, exercising, writing, taking photographs, walking, socialising, enjoying good food and drink and conversation, being busy around the house and działka - all these things are a good use of time.

The other day in the office I caught myself staring out of the window. At first it was interest in the construction work going on in the foundations of the building that will be called Central Point, that will emerge nearby. But then my attention wandered, I was drifting, lazily, while an urgent e-mailshot needed checking (four attachments in legal English)... the sky, the clouds, mind entirely elsewhere...

It's all too easy to do. There are many frivolous demands on our time. Television I stopped watching years ago; sport I don't follow (I push myself in my daily exercise routines rather than watch others pushing themselves while I'm sprawled on a couch with beer and crisps).

Writing - I should do more. Yes, I've been blogging for over 12 years, and a fine body of work is building up; I enjoy coming back to old posts I wrote several years ago and seeing how my thinking - and indeed writing - has evolved over time. I have got a book for self-publishing in the pipeline, it's coming on nicely especially now I've moved it from Microsoft Word to Google Docs (access via any device, am always working on the latest version). But still not enough. I should be knocking out four or five pages a day every day (I have most of the material, it needs to be ordered, polished and completed).

Office work - I'm doing less than in previous years, when I used to have commissions from five or more businesses in the space of a tax year, at least three being regular work. Now - mainly to avoid bureaucratic hassle and unpredictability - it's just the one (the Chamber). 2018 was the first tax year in which I received just one PIT-11D tax form. More time for myself, but not to waste.

Not doing anything brings on anxiety in me - the anxiety caused by the passage of time during which nothing has been achieved nor moved forward.

Social media - one often reads that you can only do three well. For me it's Blogger, Twitter - and - for a far smaller number of friends I've known for decades rather than merely years - Facebook. LinkedIn I use rarely (should do more on LinkedIn, especially work related stuff), but if three's the limit then LinkedIn becomes the one too many.

It's easy to waste time on social media. Twitter in particular, especially if you believe it helps shape social and thus political attitudes. I have spent an inordinate amount of time on Twitter combatting Brexit; it would be so huge a disaster for me personally that I cannot just let it happen unopposed.

Sleep is important and so is exercise - before retiring every night, I do press-ups, throw some weights around, do some chin-ups and planks (as I do each morning). Good habits, good routine. Good health.

Well, enough blogging - exercise time and an early night!

[The title of this post brought back memories of Children's Favorites on the BBC Light Programme in the early- and mid-1960s - where this song made famous by Bing Crosby was frequently played.]



This time last year:
Retracing my grandfather's footsteps

This time two years ago:
The opening of the open-air gym, Jeziorki

[Incidentally, two years ago today, the winning tender for the construction of the first section of the S7 extension from Grójec to the S2/S79 junction by the airport was announced. As now, not a hand's turn of work has been carried out on the ground here.]

This time five years ago:
Springtime pictorial

This time six years ago:
Kitten time!

This time seven years ago:
Warsaw - Centrum to Jeziorki by train with super-wide lens

This time eight years ago:
Loose Lips Sink Ships - part II

This time nine years ago:
Jeziorki in the infra red 

This time ten years ago:
Some rain, at last!