Month: October 2024

To just be….or not to just be?!

There’s a woman who lives across the street from me. From my bedroom window, I have a regular view of her feet perched on a stool, presumably in front of the TV. As I spot her feet, I wonder what she’s watching, how she managed to carve that time for herself and how relaxed she must feel.
M y feet are rarely perched – always in some hurry – and the moment they do stop, I’m left with this sinking feeling: “I should be doing more.”I’m jealous of the woman across the street – not because she has fewer demands than I do, or because I even want to watch TV, but because she allows herself to stop.
Over the years, the notion of free time has evolved. The Greeks viewed it as the pursuit of leisurely activities, while the Romans saw it as a time of recuperation. What has remained a constant is the principle that free time stands in contrast to work. Psychotherapist Laura Patterson defines ‘free time’ as “time away from the constant demands you have on your time”. It denotes a sense of freedom – an opportunity to escape the daily grind and, in the words of Patterson, “a chance to simply ‘be’.”

Free time also offers a host of benefits for our health, yet many people view leisure as wasteful and unproductive. It’s no surprise that those who hold this belief report lower levels of happiness.
I believed free time was important, but I had fallen into the trap of thinking I was starved of time and could not afford to free any of it. While the term ‘time affluence’ describes the sense that you have time to spare, ‘time famine’ represents the feeling of not having enough time. The latter led me to believe I had to maximise every waking hour. I was driven to anxiety by thoughts of “how can I make the most of this time?”

DOING VERSUS BEING
Counsellor Georgina Sturmer equates the anxiety that can be caused by free time with “a sense of guilt that we ‘should’ be doing more; that we don’t know what to do with ourselves when we have free time because we are conditioned to prize productivity”.
“We have grown up in a society that links our achievements with our self-worth,” she explains. “This means that we don’t always know who we are, or what to do, when we don’t have a task to complete.”
This can also come from the blueprints we have been handed by our family, says Patterson. “If you come from a family who values downtime, you are much more likely to find it acceptable than if you come from a family who are always on the go.”
How we link our productivity – even subconsciously – with our self-esteem is key to understanding where so much of this pressure comes from. Patterson explains that free time, or the opportunity to do nothing, “allows us to replenish our energy stores”. But many associate it with laziness, implying that it is something we neither need nor deserve.
This belief drives us to keep doing and when we stop, we question ourselves. Patterson describes this uncomfortable feeling as “an inability to sit with oneself”. She asks us to consider what it might feel like to do nothing: “You are most likely avoiding the shame that is coming from this.”
Naturally, if we tend to feel shame or discomfort during periods of free time, we try to push away these feelings by keeping busy. Sturmer points out that “our internal monologue might become more critical as we slow down”, so that the idea of being alone with our thoughts spurs us into further action.

A WOMAN’S LOAD
“Based on what I see in clinical practice, men do not seem to suffer the same anxiety [regarding free time],” says Patterson. In the past couple of years, she says she has encountered more women who have self-diagnosed themselves with ADHD due to feeling that they are incapable of focusing on one thing. While many of these diagnoses are legitimate, Patterson believes that for some people something else is to blame: “it is the never ending to-do list causing this – the mental load of women.”
Time has moved on and women have found their place in the professional world – yet many of us still face intense pressures at home. “For women, it seems only natural that they ‘should’ be able to juggle lots of balls at the same time,” notes Sturmer. “If we are constantly juggling, then we are never going to feel that our to-do list has been completed; that we are allowed to do nothing at all.”
Social media fuel these feelings: women who appear to ‘have it all’ take centre stage on our newsfeeds, reaffirming that we should be trying to do the same. ‘Should’ can be a damaging word, especially when it comes to how we spend our free time.

HOW TO FREE OURSELVES FROM FREE-TIME ANXIETY
MINDFULNESS
Mindfulness has been linked to benefits including stress reduction and enhanced mood. But more than this, it also helps build self-awareness. By practising mindfulness in our free time, we can learn to observe unhelpful thoughts and how to let go of them. It is also an intentional effort that might appeal to those seeking tangible outcomes from their free time.
WRITE IT DOWN
“Journaling and to-do lists are great for tipping out the contents of the mind to clear the psychic space for clarity of thought,” says Patterson. “It is important to remember, however, that the to-do list is never ending. By writing it down we can contain what is swimming around in our minds but we must never beat ourselves up if we do not complete it.”
TURN OFF YOUR DEVICES
During brief moments of free time we tend to take out our devices and check our email or scroll through the feed we just checked 30 minutes ago. This might feel like we’re switching off but really, we are further stimulating ourselves. Sturmer encourages us to turn off these devices in order to “see what happens when we don’t have the digital world to fall back on”.
SELF-COMPASSION
Patterson believes we need to “recognise the critical voice that tells you you will not be good enough if you don’t do x, y, or z – and decommission it.” What would you say to a friend in this moment? By cultivating a more understanding relationship with ourselves, we can mitigate the impact of these negative mental states and foster resilience.
THINK OF THE LONG GAME
The term hyperopia describes the habit of overestimating the benefits one will receive in the future from making responsible decisions now. The reality is, though, that a fulfilling future isn’t built by only spending our time ‘productively’. Our health and happiness is of value, too. It’s tempting to think that spending out free time in unproductive ways isn’t a decision for the future, but this is something we need to unlearn. Often, it’s worth choosing pleasure.
Patterson urges us “when considering choice, to choose you”. You are much more precious than any of the tasks on your to-do list. I will try to remind myself of this as I gaze from my bedroom window at the woman across the street.