Busyness!
Think about it…
“I’m busy!”
How often is that your excuse?
It used to be my excuse every single day. My schedule used to leave me zero time for unplanned presence and awareness.
And I was proud of my busyness. I wore it like a badge!
“Didn’t you hear me? I am super busy, everybody! Keep this in mind, and have mercy on me! Please!”
Yes, that’s exactly what I used to want you to know about me…
But not anymore.
Now I actually pause, just to be and breathe. And I’m proud of it.
Here’s the thing: Busyness is NOT a badge of honor. There’s no honor at all in busyness.
Busyness is just an illness that makes everything harder than it has to be.
Busy for the Sake of Busy
If we’re not below the poverty line, juggling three jobs at once just to put food on the table, then our busyness is self-inflicted 98% of the time (the exception being that 2% of the time that a random series of incredibly difficult life events blindsides us).
I finally got a handle on my busyness when I studied it long enough to realize that, yes… my busyness was within my control. In fact, most of the time I actually created hurry and worry where none really existed. On any normal weekday, you would have found me running around begging family, business associates, and basically everyone nearby to move faster…
“If you don’t finish eating, we’re going to be late!”
“If we don’t get this task done in the next hour… we’re never going to hit our target!”
The funny thing is, whether I provoked everyone around me to move faster or not, we always collectively moved at about the same pace anyway. But when I provoked them, everyone (including myself) was unhappier.
It became crystal clear to me that nearly all of my busyness was an overreaction in my head. I was manufacturing it in hopes that it would create urgency in others, and somehow make my life easier. Instead, it did the exact opposite—my busyness only created anxiety, bitterness and complexity. And even on days when there really were lots of things to do, it was typically due to an overbooked schedule I had personally (and mindlessly) created.
All of this got me thinking:
Why in the world am I voluntarily making my life harder, busier and unhappier than it has to be?
The Reason and Answer for Needless Busyness (and Misery)
Sadly, a big part of the reason we fill our lives with needless busyness has to do with the always-connected, always-sharing, always-comparing society we live in.
We default to defining ourselves based on where we are and what we have in relation to everyone else.
If we don’t have a “better” career, house, car, or pair of shoes, we feel inferior. And the only way we can possibly do better, is to be busier doing… whatever! After all, we are what we do, right? Job title, employer… Aren’t these typically the first things we share with strangers we meet at parties?
We fill our Instagram, Facebook and Snapchat feeds, and our calendars, with manufactured busyness to avoid just being exactly who we are, exactly where we are. In the process, we not only miss out on the serenity and beauty that exists within ourselves, but we also miss out on experiencing that same serenity and beauty in the world around us, because our busyness has buried it with “hurry” and “worry,” and the endless need to be somewhere else, doing something else, as fast as feasibly possible.
Ready for a positive change in your life?
Join me, and let’s start mindfully letting our needless busyness and stress GO!
Let’s start CHANGING THE WAY WE THINK about all the things we "should" be doing, so we can start doing the right things, and actually live better lives.
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