Discussion Forum > Making time for idleness and reverie
michael:
Mais parmi les chacals, les panthères, les lices,
Les singes, les scorpions, les vautours, les serpents,
Les monstres glapissants, hurlants, grognants, rampants,
Dans la ménagerie infâme de nos vices,
II en est un plus laid, plus méchant, plus immonde!
Quoiqu'il ne pousse ni grands gestes ni grands cris,
Il ferait volontiers de la terre un débris
Et dans un bâillement avalerait le monde;
C'est l'Ennui! L'oeil chargé d'un pleur involontaire,
II rêve d'échafauds en fumant son houka.
Tu le connais, lecteur, ce monstre délicat,
— Hypocrite lecteur, — mon semblable, — mon frère!
(Baudelaire)
Mais parmi les chacals, les panthères, les lices,
Les singes, les scorpions, les vautours, les serpents,
Les monstres glapissants, hurlants, grognants, rampants,
Dans la ménagerie infâme de nos vices,
II en est un plus laid, plus méchant, plus immonde!
Quoiqu'il ne pousse ni grands gestes ni grands cris,
Il ferait volontiers de la terre un débris
Et dans un bâillement avalerait le monde;
C'est l'Ennui! L'oeil chargé d'un pleur involontaire,
II rêve d'échafauds en fumant son houka.
Tu le connais, lecteur, ce monstre délicat,
— Hypocrite lecteur, — mon semblable, — mon frère!
(Baudelaire)
April 10, 2016 at 20:27 |
Mark Forster
Mark Forster
I am fascinated by this striving versus reflecting duality. Sloth is of course sinful! But then workaholism is perhaps equally so. Bertrand Russell even went so far as to advocate a 4 hour working day.
I found this:
“Against the grain of this [U.S. cultural] optimism, I would argue that melancholia sometimes leads to insights and ways of thinking not accessible to joy, and that poetry especially is richer when the voices of melancholy are not shouted down by the voices of optimism,” writes James Pate.
- http://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet/2015/07/let-melancholy-not-be-diluted-by-cheap-optimism-santiago-vizcainos-destruction-in-the-afternoon/?woo
I found this:
“Against the grain of this [U.S. cultural] optimism, I would argue that melancholia sometimes leads to insights and ways of thinking not accessible to joy, and that poetry especially is richer when the voices of melancholy are not shouted down by the voices of optimism,” writes James Pate.
- http://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet/2015/07/let-melancholy-not-be-diluted-by-cheap-optimism-santiago-vizcainos-destruction-in-the-afternoon/?woo
April 11, 2016 at 19:12 |
michael
michael
michael:
http://www.zpub.com/notes/idle.html
Mind you, as the son of a viscount, the grandson of a Prime Minister and the great-grandson of a duke, Bertrand Russell could afford to take a suitably patrician view of idleness.
http://www.zpub.com/notes/idle.html
Mind you, as the son of a viscount, the grandson of a Prime Minister and the great-grandson of a duke, Bertrand Russell could afford to take a suitably patrician view of idleness.
April 11, 2016 at 21:23 |
Mark Forster
Mark Forster
@ michael
I think boredom and melancholy are two different things. And I'd not go that far to make space for melancholy on purpose because that is a state of mind that just happens and I don't think we should look for it. Oriental meditation suggests that we don't try to look the other way when we're sad or upset, but to try and experience that feeling fully while observing ourselves and our reactions; that has the effect to wash away the bad feeling thanks to the aquired consciousness. However I think the next logical step is to face what we discovered to be the problems afflicting us, not to look for more blue.
That said, I remember that when I was a teenager I liked to indulge into melancholy. It wasn't sadness, as I remember to like it particularly in very happy moments like a party that I was enjoying for example, where I would isolate myself somewhere ruminating about some girl or friendship or other "high" things. It kind of "contrasted" me, allowing me to experience a broader range of feelings.
Malancholy in that sense isn't that bad. I don't know, I'm probably confusing melancholy with grief and what I wrote previously about meditation is really to be intended with the latter.
Boredom, I was never good at liking it.
I think boredom and melancholy are two different things. And I'd not go that far to make space for melancholy on purpose because that is a state of mind that just happens and I don't think we should look for it. Oriental meditation suggests that we don't try to look the other way when we're sad or upset, but to try and experience that feeling fully while observing ourselves and our reactions; that has the effect to wash away the bad feeling thanks to the aquired consciousness. However I think the next logical step is to face what we discovered to be the problems afflicting us, not to look for more blue.
That said, I remember that when I was a teenager I liked to indulge into melancholy. It wasn't sadness, as I remember to like it particularly in very happy moments like a party that I was enjoying for example, where I would isolate myself somewhere ruminating about some girl or friendship or other "high" things. It kind of "contrasted" me, allowing me to experience a broader range of feelings.
Malancholy in that sense isn't that bad. I don't know, I'm probably confusing melancholy with grief and what I wrote previously about meditation is really to be intended with the latter.
Boredom, I was never good at liking it.
April 14, 2016 at 14:56 |
Lorenzo
Lorenzo
Scheduling high quality "Goof Off Time" into the day makes me more productive. Just knowing I have it coming up keeps me motivated to fully finish the task at hand so I can enjoy the time off with more peace of mind and freedom from thinking about the incompletion still alive in my brain.
April 20, 2016 at 19:54 |
Peter "The TimeMan" Turla
Peter "The TimeMan" Turla
Using 5T (loosely) has helped me balance my relaxation time better. I try to keep each batch to about an hour.
Actually, more like 5/0T. List 5 tasks, and finish them all. Mostly. In theory. In reality I often miss one or two, but then have to decide whether to go back to them or delete.
I often see that a batch will exhaust me, so add a relaxation task. Or I see that an entire hour is really undemanding, so add something harder.
It leads to a much better balance compared to unfocused work, often of low importance, followed by too much difficult work in a long stretch.
Actually, more like 5/0T. List 5 tasks, and finish them all. Mostly. In theory. In reality I often miss one or two, but then have to decide whether to go back to them or delete.
I often see that a batch will exhaust me, so add a relaxation task. Or I see that an entire hour is really undemanding, so add something harder.
It leads to a much better balance compared to unfocused work, often of low importance, followed by too much difficult work in a long stretch.
April 24, 2016 at 5:17 |
Cricket
Cricket
On reflection, I think I was trying to suggest that time needs setting aside for self-reflection, as well as rest and relaxation. Without self-knowledge activity can be doing out of the need for distraction, or doing for the sake of having done something. Purposeful activity needs self awareness as a foundation. I use Gibbs' reflective cycle myself: http://www.businessballs.com/reflective-practice.htm
April 26, 2016 at 9:53 |
michael
michael
I've been reading "How to be bored" by Eva Hoffmann who argues, in part, that digital technologies have altered our sense of time and created an addiction to stimulus and activity. She argues we must set apart time for musing and reverie and idleness to re-orient ourselves.
She is interviewed at http://soundcloud.com/radioheadspace/54-how-to-be-pt-2-eva-hoffman