This week's blog:
“My wife has finally realized that she has a tendency to over book” my brother says to me and the concept doesn’t quite register with me. He says he understands that they only get so much time with their kids and don’t want to miss out on any opportunities, but…And my head is slowly nodding although I’m still not sure where I draw the line in this struggle.
Because in theory, I recognize that there is some importance to idle time and rest. But it’s sometimes difficult to recognize the value of idleness on my infinite path of joy. I’m always looking to fill our one day off with fun, fulfilling, challenging, socially-connected, quality activities. It is not, after all, called “Sunday Funday” for nothing! And I learned in “happy class” (did you know you can take an on-line Yale course on increasing happiness? You can and it’s free and I recommend it), that all those things lead to a more joyful, happy, fulfilling life.
But sometimes, the path of infinite joy is quite exhausting. It’s difficult to fit all that fun into one day a week (I know, I know, it will all balance out in the winter, but we’re talking about the here and now at this moment—winter seems a long way away), and sometimes, you just need to do the stuff that gets done on Sunday like mowing, and cleaning, and giving the dog her really bad summer haircut. Oh, and resting. That gets done on Sundays too.
So I don’t know if I’m going to lay off the cramming of the fun, fulfilling, challenging, socially-connected, quality activities on Sunday Funday, but perhaps I might be slightly less inclined to freak out when those plans fall through and I’m suddenly staring at an empty Sunday calendar. After all, there’s always a list-in-waiting of things that get done on Sundays that I put off in the name of fun. It will always be there for me in case of idleness.
