The Price of Being "Too Busy"
2007
Article available also in Swedish and French
Are you too busy to read this? If you are, you are not alone.
As the saying goes: "welcome to the human race". And what a race it has become. Survey after survey today reports that most people feel that they just don't have enough time to do all that needs to get done. Whether fully employed or retired, living in some cosmopolitan international city or a small town, working in the home or at the office, the common refrain is the same - most people feel they are running out of time. People see themselves as over-committed, over-scheduled, and over-whelmed. Worse, the faster they run, the further behind they often feel. Among career, being single, or being parent families, lack of time is a way of life.
We pay a severe price for being too busy. More than individuals and families suffer from this time famine. Culture, that which by definition must be cultivated, tilled, nurtured, and grown, is harmed. Civilization is threatened.
The increasing lack of civility in public discourse may very well be related to people being weary and worn out. Exhausted people don't have the time or energy to be all that polite. And politeness, as the word suggests, is what makes politics possible, not to mention sometimes an art. Art, like politics, like culture, like thought, requires time.
Some blame high technology for this crisis. They point out that car phones, answering machines and computers have revved up both lives and expectations. In this fast-lane, fast-paced, fast-food, fax-it-to-me-now culture, no one seems willing to wait anymore. More than one social commentator has observed what sweet irony it is that the very technology which was supposed to ease modern life and create more leisure time has, in fact, only made people more efficient. Other see society's worship of success as the main culprit.
There is a not so subtle connection between being busy and being successful. Successful people are on the move and on the go. The early bird, children learn, catches the worm. And it is more than interesting to note the word "speed" and the word "success" come from the same root word - implying, of course, that the faster one moves, the more likely one is to become a success. Again, there is some truth in this, but the fundamental cause of lack of time is the lack of spiritual discipline.
To experience God, all the world religions speak of the need to slow down, to calm down, to rest, to pause, to be humble and listen. Over the centuries, every major faith has developed spiritual disciplines designed to make God more real and relevant to the seeker.
The Hebrew Psalmist teaches the reader to number his or her days, that all time is in God's hands. Buddhists practice mindfulness through meditation. Yoga comes from Hinduism. Among Christian mystics and monks, chanting, deep breathing, and contemplative prayer are used to help the disciple to take what the Jesuits call the long loving look at creation, to listen for the divine in solitude and silence. "God,"
Novel Peace Prize Winner, Mother Teresa, writes: "is a friend of silence and can be found in silence."
The great mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal once said: "all evil in the world comes from not being able to sit alone in a room."
If Pascal was right, and I believe he was, then there has probably never been a time when we need to practice the spiritual disciplines of slowing down more than today.
If nothing else in this busy world, we might remember the safety rules we learned as little children. Before crossing the street, we were taught to always stop, look and listen. Before things get too busy each day, we should at least do the same.
Christian-Charles de Plicque
www.deplicque.net
(2007)
design by gekko