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Doing nothing. We've been indoctrinated from an early age to be productive, to schedule every moment, to sacrifice sleep, to always be learning, building, netw

Doing nothing. We've been indoctrinated from an early age to be productive, to schedule every moment, to sacrifice sleep, to always be learning, building, networking, searching and improving. The covid19 lockdown is showing many people the benefits of disconnecting, de-scheduling, refusing or ignoring invitations, and being still with our thoughts for hours or days at a time, producing nothing of tangible economic value.

Thorentis 6y ago
Nice, how do I invest?
- Cerium 6y ago
  Grab a drink, grab a chair, walk outside and sit down.
hckr_news 6y ago
This is great advice but I’m a procrastinator. I have a full time job already in software but it’s incredibly hard for me to get any will power to work on side projects such as getting a business going or just working on open source. I might need to hear the opposite of this.
- eeh 6y ago
  Is your perception of yourself being a procrastinator a result of having "been indoctrinated from an early age to be productive, to schedule every moment"? Taking a view from Positive Psychology, the ABCDE explanation for this thought pattern might go something like: * [Activating event] You observe yourself not working on side projects * [Belief] People without side projects or their own businesses are failures * [Consequence] Label oneself a procrastinator, and feel bad * [Disputation] People can have meaningful/successful lives without having side projects. People require maintenance in the form of leisure/downtime. Your procrastination is yourself striving for leisure/downtime. * [Effect] Feel good about activities you previously labelled as procrastination. I'm not qualified in this area, but this helps me, at least. https://positivepsychology.com/albert-ellis-abc-model-rebt-cbt/ https://positivepsychology.com/albert-ellis-abc-model-rebt-c...
bonniemuffin 6y ago
I love this trend and hope you're right that it grows. A year ago, all of my hours were optimized, quantified, and monetized. My work and social calendars were equally overstuffed, leading to a frantic feeling of being too busy and falling behind on everything. Now I have time to experience JOMO, the joy of missing out.
aiisjustanif 6y ago
Inversely many working are being exploited to make sure companies stay afloat after many layoffs. Or hospital workers pushing their limits being understaffed. Many long hours, insanely hard to disconnect, we definitely have two different extremes going on between people.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
rmrfstar 6y ago
> producing nothing of tangible economic value Just because something has a low/zero market price does not mean it has no economic value. It just means it is not valued by people with lots of money and their pals in government. Similarly, just because something has a high market price does not mean it has real economic value. See, e.g. LBO funds and their ridiculous fees. Market prices are determined as much by market structure as they are by people's preferences.
- nine_zeros 6y ago
  This is a very good point. If we extend this to the extreme, lets say only 1 person has 99% of the wealth. The whole economic system will only produce goods that are required by that 1 person and their close associates. Historically, that was a monarch and that led to things like French revolution. I think the US needs one now.
marajit 6y ago
theres an app for that
flatfilefan 6y ago
A lady tells her friend: - My son adopted Meditation - Anything is better than just sitting around and doing nothing. It’s a short joke, but a recurve one :-)
sershe 6y ago
I have a end-of-fiscal-year crunch at my now WFH job and arranging outdoor activities is harder with all the restrictions, and finding partners is harder when I'm not doing them with my wife. And, with not as many things to do and more uncertainty, I'm now much more connected (both as far as work goes as people want me to refer them or try to hire me under pretext of "how are you/your job doing in this crisis", and also reading news again which is stupid, watching TV which I normally never do, etc.). I've never been more stressed out and connected!
siquick 6y ago
> We've been indoctrinated from an early age to be productive, to schedule every moment, to sacrifice sleep, to always be learning, building, networking, searching and improving. This is definitely more of an American thing in my experience.
- lol636363 6y ago
  In my experience, as a Pakistani who grew up in the middle east and had friends from all over the world in an American college, it is pretty universal to feel pressured to be doing something productive all the time.

Thorentis 6y ago

Nice, how do I invest?

Cerium 6y ago
Grab a drink, grab a chair, walk outside and sit down.

hckr_news 6y ago

This is great advice but I’m a procrastinator. I have a full time job already in software but it’s incredibly hard for me to get any will power to work on side projects such as getting a business going or just working on open source. I might need to hear the opposite of this.

eeh 6y ago
Is your perception of yourself being a procrastinator a result of having "been indoctrinated from an early age to be productive, to schedule every moment"? Taking a view from Positive Psychology, the ABCDE explanation for this thought pattern might go something like: * [Activating event] You observe yourself not working on side projects * [Belief] People without side projects or their own businesses are failures * [Consequence] Label oneself a procrastinator, and feel bad * [Disputation] People can have meaningful/successful lives without having side projects. People require maintenance in the form of leisure/downtime. Your procrastination is yourself striving for leisure/downtime. * [Effect] Feel good about activities you previously labelled as procrastination. I'm not qualified in this area, but this helps me, at least. https://positivepsychology.com/albert-ellis-abc-model-rebt-cbt/ https://positivepsychology.com/albert-ellis-abc-model-rebt-c...

bonniemuffin 6y ago

I love this trend and hope you're right that it grows. A year ago, all of my hours were optimized, quantified, and monetized. My work and social calendars were equally overstuffed, leading to a frantic feeling of being too busy and falling behind on everything. Now I have time to experience JOMO, the joy of missing out.

aiisjustanif 6y ago

Inversely many working are being exploited to make sure companies stay afloat after many layoffs. Or hospital workers pushing their limits being understaffed. Many long hours, insanely hard to disconnect, we definitely have two different extremes going on between people.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

rmrfstar 6y ago

> producing nothing of tangible economic value Just because something has a low/zero market price does not mean it has no economic value. It just means it is not valued by people with lots of money and their pals in government. Similarly, just because something has a high market price does not mean it has real economic value. See, e.g. LBO funds and their ridiculous fees. Market prices are determined as much by market structure as they are by people's preferences.

nine_zeros 6y ago
This is a very good point. If we extend this to the extreme, lets say only 1 person has 99% of the wealth. The whole economic system will only produce goods that are required by that 1 person and their close associates. Historically, that was a monarch and that led to things like French revolution. I think the US needs one now.

marajit 6y ago

theres an app for that

flatfilefan 6y ago

A lady tells her friend: - My son adopted Meditation - Anything is better than just sitting around and doing nothing. It’s a short joke, but a recurve one :-)

sershe 6y ago

I have a end-of-fiscal-year crunch at my now WFH job and arranging outdoor activities is harder with all the restrictions, and finding partners is harder when I'm not doing them with my wife. And, with not as many things to do and more uncertainty, I'm now much more connected (both as far as work goes as people want me to refer them or try to hire me under pretext of "how are you/your job doing in this crisis", and also reading news again which is stupid, watching TV which I normally never do, etc.). I've never been more stressed out and connected!

siquick 6y ago

> We've been indoctrinated from an early age to be productive, to schedule every moment, to sacrifice sleep, to always be learning, building, networking, searching and improving. This is definitely more of an American thing in my experience.

lol636363 6y ago
In my experience, as a Pakistani who grew up in the middle east and had friends from all over the world in an American college, it is pretty universal to feel pressured to be doing something productive all the time.