Let’s Get (Less) Busy!
There’s a much quoted/misquoted poem by Rose Milligan (no relation at all to Spike) that begins with the verse;
Dust if you must, but wouldn’t it be better
To paint a picture, or write a letter,
Bake a cake, or plant a seed;
Ponder the difference between want and need?
Lotti planting handmade seed bombs
The poem ‘Dust if you Must’ was first published in The Lady magazine in 1998 and has been used to illustrate perfectly how we can become easily overwhelmed with thoughts of what we should be doing as opposed to what we could be doing to occupy our leisure time. I think this should/could dilemma has a lot to do with the glorification of ‘busy’ that seems to exist in our society today.
In fact when I was looking for an antonym for busy I was surprised, actually shocked, to see that the words listed as having the opposite meaning were ‘lazy,’ ‘idle’ and ‘unemployed.’ I think most people would interpret this to mean that we are in some way doing something wrong if we are not busy, and it is understandable if this toxic view of the human’s purpose on earth is causing some of us overwhelm and impacting negatively on our wellbeing.
Now of course, in the right context being busy is definitely a good thing! I mean our employers wouldn’t be very happy if were not using our time productively, and rightly so, but where possible we want to try and avoid being ‘too busy’ for too long in the work environment as this can cause us stress. Also, having a purpose can be really important to the way we feel about ourselves, so the right kind of busy is definitely good for us. On the other hand, we shouldn’t feel guilty for not wanting to busy all the time. ‘Side hustles’ and ‘hobbies’ are all well and good, but these should be enriching our lives, and not stealing away our time to relax.
I find as I get older, I need to build in more time to step back from the busyness of the demands of life. This is so that I have energy to maintain the things that sustain me, like my day job, community interests and creative pursuits. I work full-time and some long days so I don’t want to spend my whole weekends cleaning, supermarket shopping and washing clothes (I don’t really do ironing) but it needs to be done at some point. Instead I have developed a habit of getting up early at the weekend and getting those essential jobs out of the way so I can enjoy the rest of the day. I have also learned to lower my expectations of what I will get done, so I don’t find myself cleaning between the bathroom tiles with and old toothbrush at 2pm on a Saturday afternoon! Yes, I really used to do this…
We keep being reminded how good indulging in some creative time can be for rebalancing our brains so I think it I really important that we make sure we allocate some time in our week to make that happen. This might be one or two evenings a week, or longer stretches of time at the weekend, and might not happen every week, and that’s fine. I believe we need to spend more of our time ‘being’ not just ‘doing’ and I think that’s what Rose Milligan wanted us to think about. Let’s be kinder ourselves by taking off the pressure from time to time and give ourselves the opportunity to make the distinction between what we think we ‘want’ and what we actually ‘need.’
Whilst you are here, why not pop on over to our activities page for some creative inspiration? Immerse yourself in the art of self care.
Bees & Love
Debra Thortify
