BANTER WITHOUT DOORS
On
Duru Chimezie's Maiden edition of Banter Without Doors, he's making a very
tiring effort to convince us all that our idle time is the best time we can
have and very much all we need, to become world beaters. You should read and
find out if he succeeds with you too as he is really succeeding with the rest..
Now,
before you dust off your old dad's 1971 German Riffle in pleasing readiness to
gun me down (owing to your obvious disagreement with the title up there),
please do you mind us exchanging some needed pleasantries first? Thank you. You
are just the best, you know.
It
is my first ever edition of what will become a weekly entry and how so
exhilarated I am. And you know what? I deserve all the pleasantries I can
garner. While you have every right to hold all animosity in the whole wide
world right against me, it is not out of place to first recognize we are only
meeting for the first time now and then regain your stance later. Fine.
So
let me begin by getting something straight. I believe you will strongly accept
that there are two categories of individual walking our blissful world. Yeah,
two. You might be splitting mankind into two in all manner of classifications already,
but hey, I am yet to say a thing. The two categories I refer to, are simply the
'extremely busy' and the 'less busy'. I accept that one can have them split even further up (I am
not that stingy with my thoughts) to get things like; Really really busy; Well,
quite busy; Busy; Occasionally busy; Not that busy; Less busy and then Bored,
if you may. But then, my major interest is where you would happily accept you
belong. Whether we believe it or not, we
are one of these categories, most especially when it is as strict as the
earlier two-way classification.
The
very busy people are those people who have just about no time free in their 24
hour clock. From the time they wake in the morning (that is if you ain't one of
those who rise 1pm everyday of your lives) down to the last second left to make
it a full day, they always have something doing. Now don't start me with asking
if there are people who have the opposite of such lives (I see you saying that
everything a person does with any time/period of his day is important to him). While
I am not really going to go into the argument of if every person's time, is
important to him, I will cheerfully remind you that if there were no things as
being busy or being idle, then whoever that may have used the words first (I
think he did a good job) wouldn't have done so. Equally, the rest of the world
(excluding you) wouldn't have happily accepted to adopt them as terms. I assume
we have put to bed the argument now. Let's continue.
Just
like you have the very busy, the opposite is there. There are the less busy. Remember,
assuming we are to follow the classification in two strict angles. The less
busy are obviously those who 'think' and 'accept' they are either bored (obviously
a lack of what to find interesting to do) or have the time to commit to new
activities that pop up everyday. Even with less notice. They always use the
phrases, 'I should be able to attend to...' and 'I am going to be free to...'.
This does not mean that anybody who says
'I don't have the time for...' and 'I don't think I can afford the time to...'
are actually busy people. They may or may not. Those are not my focus here. What
I think beggars a larger question really, is how busy are the busy people? What
is the quality of their 'busyness'? As for the less busy, what is the quality
of your 'idleness'? And yeah, idleness can have so much quality.
Maybe
I should speak about the focus of my banter this week even though it comes
while the piece is looking set to round off (It took quite a good part of two
decades to come, phew!!). My focus is on that idle time. Everybody has got one.
And in most cases, it is actually idle timessssssssss! (MS Word has placed a deafening
red stroke under this word as I type, that's how alarming it is). Even the
busiest person in the planet (some call Matt Morgan; well, you are busy and
still granted an interview?!) still has time to sleep a couple hours a day; do
manicure (even if it is once in thirteen months); remember his name at every
form he fills and even yawns when tired. Definitely there are idle times. Very
very very (and I can go on) small for some people while being enormously
massive and excess for the rest. The question once again is, how successfully
well does your idle time(s) affect your life?
"Don't
be fooled by the calendar. There are only as many idle days in the year
as you make use of. One man gets only a week's value out of a year-worth of
idle time while another man gets a full year's value out of a week-worth
of idle time". These are the famous words of Charles Richards. Well,
with the stroked additions from me included. And you know what? It puts it
together perfectly! What really matters, is the worth of your idle time. Unfortunately
enough, you are not permitted to include the time you spend in your regular job
or field in this context. The idle time here is that time you feel you can
safely use to relax, read a book, check up cool websites (sports for the boys
and celebrity news for the gals) and other things my fingers will be weary of
typing here. While I am strongly going to recommend having these times listed
earlier, in your daily schedule when they matter, I wish to say that we often do
find ourselves caught up in having too much of them. Hence the use of the word,
obsession, difficult habit and even addiction.
Now,
why would I ask you to want to be idle via my caption only to be saying the
opposite here? Well, I am still saying the same. Choosing to be idle at anytime
to you can, can be the best thing your life can benefit from you but then, the
quality. The quality should be there. I am simply asking us to learn to invest
our idle time in doing 'idle things' that would (and in most cases shall) give
us more success than we may get from the rest of our time (including that
invested in your regular job or trade). This process will begin with a thinking
pattern. Questions like "what things do I enjoy doing most and without
stress?" and if you are already doing so in the nature of your regular job,
should be "what OTHER things do I enjoy doing most and without stress?".
Everybody has got more than one gift or talent so definitely, a hard
thought, will rightly give you an answer.
Learn
to put your idle time into that other side of your abilities as a person. Will
that time still be idle? You might ask. Well, yes it is. Simply because, it is
an 'idle thing' for you. My definition of 'idle things' is, the collection of
things you know how to do but would consider not to do them because 'you think'
they would benefit you little (mostly in financial and material terms). And
that brings us to the next phase. Why don't you try seeing these things become
a source of (financial, intellectual or moral)success? I mean, if I know I
write well albeit being a Lawyer by study and probably practicing. Why can't I
think about being involved in regular Written Review Commentaries or something alike with my idle time? At least
that also gives me a stage to equally sharpen my judgmental skills as a trained
Lawyer. This is exactly what I mean by wishing you could have more of such idle
times because most often than not, people tend to achieve massive success from
things they initially set out to do as a hobby. And this is irrespective of whatever
measure of success and pride they equally derive from their regular career
paths/jobs or fields.
Therefore,
now we have become friends (here's beaming from ear to ear), can we just leave ourselves
with a little take-home assignment? Use the next seven days, to think out other
traits and abilities you must have
noticed you have which ain't always in regular use. Then begin planning on how
you are gonna convert a good portion of your idle time to making it a successful
aspect of your life. See you next Thursday. Thanks for reading.
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