Wasting Time
John A. “Jack” Taylor served the Unitarian Church of Ithaca, New York with distinction for over two decades, during which time he also occupied one of the chaplain positions at Cornell University. He was my senior by twenty-five years, and as my closest colleague geographically, Jack served as a source of inspiration and a sometimes mentor for his youthful counterpart from Binghamton.
Jack was a gifted writer and one of the finest progressive preachers I’ve had the privilege of witnessing. His formula: one hour of solid preparation for every minute of pulpit time. That counts as half of a typical work week, but Jack was also responsible for pastoral care, fund raising, administration, and community outreach for his three-hundred fifty member congregation. Needless to say, for much of his professional life he burned the candle at both ends.
By the time he retired, I’d already moved on from upstate New York to Wisconsin. Shortly thereafter, Jack penned a letter (not an email) of congratulation in which he included several pieces of parting advice. These had mostly to do with the challenges facing a new ministry, but the one observation that stuck with me over the years was this: “If I had it to do over,” Jack wrote,” I’d have taken more naps.”
Only in my own post-professional life have I begun to appreciate Jack’s fatherly counsel. I didn’t nap while I was working either, not even on vacations or the single day off I allowed myself each week. In one of my final messages to the Madison congregation I conceded that in college I had acquired the habit of over-functioning - taking on a heavy load and then pushing hard until I’d carried it across the finish line. Delegation didn’t come easy: “If you want it done right, do it yourself.”
I’m hardly unique in this respect. Having prepared memorial services for any number of versatile, highly accomplished men and women and become familiar with their history, I’ve often been blown away by the level of productiveness they achieved. By the time I had finished polishing these eulogies, I felt like a piker. My subjects seem to have made a point of not wasting time “Dost thou love life?” Benjamin Franklin asked rhetorically. “Then do not squander time; for that’s the stuff life is made of.”
This was a lesson drummed into many of us along with our sums. “Uses his time wisely” was an assessment included on our elementary school report cards, and one dreaded seeing an accusatory “U” (for “unsatisfactory”) inscribed in the small adjoining box.
But what does it mean to use time “wisely?” In today’s parlance it almost always means “productively.” What counts is to move toward predetermined goals as efficiently and deliberately as possible because one has developed good work habits and internalized the values of a materialistic, consumer oriented society. Indeed, even the brief spells of leisure we permit ourselves are governed by much the same rule: make the most of it, maximize the experience. No wonder people often come back from their vacations complaining of exhaustion. Unstructured play? A waste of precious time.
It could be argued that what modern, Western culture considers “normal” and “legitimate” uses of time is less than salutary. We routinely dole out huge sums of life’s currency in ways that only leave us feeling anxious, inadequate and only temporarily sated. This is, of course, what the current economic system requires, and even those of us who rue the consequences find it hard to resist. As Jean-Louis Servan-Schreiber notes:
“From the viewpoint of time utilization, consumption is the modern era’s great neurosis, at least if we use the least clinical definition of neurosis as ‘someone intelligent doing something stupid.”
When European invaders first encountered the Indians of North America, they hastily concluded that they were unmotivated, lazy, inexplicably content with a leisurely lifestyle and disinterested in “improving” their habitat. Only godless savages would behave in such an indolent manner. Those newcomers who admired the Indians’ mores were equally despised and typically suffered the same fate as their hosts.
Similarly, the South African !Kung or Bushmen devote on average four hours a day to meeting their basic needs. These subsistence-level desert dwellers devote most of their waking hours to play, rest, nurture, and teaching the young about native plants, animals, climate, and the lay of the land. The !Kung are not acquisitive and they do not stockpile goods. From our perspective they are wasting time, but their intent is simply to savor their existence.
Early in life, and after returning from his memorable voyage on the “Beagle”, Charles Darwin wrote: ”A man who dares waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life.” The !Kung could not agree less.
So let’s ask that question again: What does it mean to spend our time wisely? Does it mean “getting and spending” until we “lay waste our powers” as the poet William Wordsworth complained? Surfing the Internet well into the night seeking validation for our conspiracy theories? Working to ensure that our own grass is greener and more uniform than the neighbors? If you can’t answer that question, take a nap and it may come to you.
