College was the #1 reason I believed that busyness was important and valuable. I attended a small women's college that constantly pursues its students to train them to become leaders. I was recruited to be in about a thousand different clubs (just like everyone else), on the executive board of two or three of them (just like everyone else), juggling a part time job (just like everyone else), and combatting a full time load of classes (just like everyone else). The culture, which I loved at the time, worshipped busyness.
I was part of a summer camp staff culture that repeated, "You can sleep when you're dead." Busyness was our business.
I went through a grad school program that hurled us into full-time classes and simultaneous full-time public school teaching. We hated it, yeah okay sure. But what exceeded our hatred of our lack of spare time was our love for complaining of busyness. We would docompare who got the least sleep. We would compare who spent the least amount of time on their midterm paper. We hated being busy but loved our storyline of busyness.
I'm smarter now, a little. I don't do stuff just for the story. Just to say I did. Just to be proud, to brag, or to complain. I do what I want, whatever is important to me, and sometimes that means spending an extra hour at work or sitting in traffic for a friend's birthday dinner. But often that includes taking a step back from work, deciding to "cook" a frozen meal, and cancelling some plans with friends.
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