Wasting time, reasons to live, and eating surfboards.

Posted: January 17, 2023 | Author: | Filed under: Adventure Forever | Tags: , , , , | Leave a comment

My favourite thing is to waste time. I struggle with it on the job. I think it’s because I’m still aware it’s my time, and that I’m officially required not to waste it due to company policy.

Company policy says wasting time is bad for your back due to desk ergonomics, and if you’re not willing to improve your desk ergonomics then they’re going to part ways with you, which is fine until they mention this’ll include ceasing paying me money each month.

Another option is to die on the job. This would be a great way to escape the boredom and depression of working, but it would seriously inhibit my free time after work, which I’d prefer to spend having fun with my wife and kids, instead of being dead at my desk due to a bad back.

But then, it’s my own time and perhaps it’d return some ownership to me, so why not die on the job?

Because the chair’s uncomfortable? I agree.

But, that’s really because it’s a chair with a purpose, and that’s to waste your time, but not in the way that you really want to waste your time. There’s better things you can do with a chair, sitting aside.

You’d rather waste your time more appropriately, such as by inventing that new thing nobody knew they wanted, or writing that blog everyone knew they didn’t want but you really wanted to write it anyway.

And don’t forget jumping – as this is a marvellous way to waste your time.

‘Off of’ things of varying height and with varying confidence in the safety harnesses, or lack of them; ‘on to’ things which are preferably moving with speed, gusto, and sexy people already onboard; ‘into’ things, the wetter the better; and lastly ‘through’ things, which is perhaps best reserved for the more athletic time wasters amongst us.

Jumping ‘behind’ things is weird, don’t do it. And don’t tell me about it if you did.

Then of course, we must consider the more industrious ways of wasting time, the sort of time wasting that really takes a lot of effort, guts, and time.

Like opening that surfboard shop in the west coast of Devon, getting to know weird people with campfire and starlight, watching the wife and kids laughing a lot, and somehow making either a comfortable living out of it or discovering an ingenious way to find, craft, sell, live underneath and eat surfboards, for free.

This takes a lot of hard work, and is of course a waste of time, because most people would not do that (despite 90% of the UK having this exact secret dream themselves, with the other 10% being busy that day) and would rather make more sensible use of their time with grown up activities, like making appointments with their bank managers for fun, or simply spending some really solid time calming down following that overly exciting bowl of cornflakes.

And then there is wasting time unexpectedly, when you didn’t see it coming. This can be hard to deal with, wasting time out of the blue, letting it get in the way of those bank manager catch-ups or becoming nice and bored in some other way. One way of doing this, as we know, is simply saying “yes” to opportunities as they come.

How do we source the best questions to say “yes” to? Just keeping saying “yes” and you’ll work your way to the questions you want to say “yes” to, eventually.

And does your job, your career, your 9-5, provide you with those questions you want to say “yes” to?

Mine doesn’t.

Mine makes me want to say “no” a lot, regardless of the question.

Really, I want to waste my time in my own way. Perhaps worse paid, and with ‘attitude problem’ noted by recruiters next to my professional profile, but still my own.

All it takes, is finding that way to monetise me being me – ensuring that wasting time with writing blogs, parenting, and seriously, seriously enjoying my wife, can all be something that pays the bills until we can find a way to eat surfboards for free.

This is making me hungry and melancholy, because I’m still at work right now and I look forward to escaping to lunch.

But I must remember to say “yes”. It’s a great way to waste time in ways you can look back on with happiness, and it’s also an even better way to round off an overlong blog.

Sam