Are you busy?

How busy are you? Please select from the following:

A) I don't have enough time to scratch myself.
B) I might be able to juggle one more ball in the air but only on a Sunday between 9am and 9.15am.
C) Pffft! Busy? You don't know the meaning of the word. I've been busy since I screamed my way out of my Mother's womb!
D) Yeah man, I'm like busy just being, you know.
E) Don't ask me to do another thing!

My answer? F. None of the above! I'm not that busy. It's a fact. I have many things to do in one day but I get it done. No questions or complaints. Why? Should I be more busy?

I realised how non-busy I am while watching those delightful (read: annoying but I couldn't be bothered turning over) infommercials on morning TV. In the space of 30 minutes I was told, not once, but three times how my life is totally out-of-control busy. 

According to the big-smiling, big-teethed, big-haired people on these ads, I am so 'time-poor', 'under pressure' and 'extremely' busy that I simply CAN NOT live without a steam mop, a juicer, a metal object that moves furniture 'effortlessly' and a ladder that bends 10 ways. Gosh! I knew something was missing in my life but I had no idea it was a ladder that could easily reach from my car to the obscure corner kitchen cabinet via the washing machine. How stupid of me! I must buy one instantly.

But then, I put my credit card down and thought, am I really that busy or do I just think I am because that's what I have been programed to think?

I'm not arguing that people can't be busy. I know much better than to do that, plus I've seen the effects stress from a busy life can have on someone. I simply want to ask the question, haven't we always been busy?

I'm sure my Grandfather was busy in 1960 raising a family of seven, working full-time and managing it all as a widow. But did anyone stop to tell him how busy he was? No! He got on with it. And so do we.  The only difference today is we have more handy 'time-saving' tools to help us navigate from one busy appointment to another.

Yes, the invention of the Internet, mobile phones, laptops (insert all technological advancements from the past decade here) and a plethora of household appliances have all made a valuable contribution to society, not to mention the way we live, but that's the way the world has always been. It has developed, evolved and changed because man (by that I mean the human race) is intelligent and wants to engage in new and exciting pastimes. 

Did we all become busier with the invention of the wheel? Did we suddenly lose our ability to be organised and time-savvy when we introduced phones in to our homes? Gee... thanks for that Mr Bell! Telephones are such a pain in the ass and add so much more to my busy day! Let's not mention back in those days you had to be connected by an operator - imagine the time that would've taken. Now we push a button or just say the person's name and they are called instantly.

I don't believe I am any busier than my grandfather was, but our lives are made up of different priorities, priorities that we place a certain level of value on once we decide if it is worthy of our time.

For exmaple, if I didn't believe going to the park with E was valuable I wouldn't put the time in to doing it. If I didn't value the creative freedom and pleasure writing this blog brings me I wouldn't find time in my 'busy' day to work on it.

No matter what you do with your life, it is my belief that if you find some level of value, pleasure or meaning from that task - you will find the time to do it. Busy or not.

The more we're told how doomed we are because we are all so inexcusably time-poor,  I feel like we may as well all pack up and head for the hills now and make time slow down. Just imagine the fury hell will unleash on us when we do all...Eek!...run out of time!! (A concept best left to someone far more superior than I to discuss. Stehpen Fry perhaps?)

Needless to say, after half an hour of hearing how I had to change my life because I am so busy, I felt compelled to yell at the idiot promising 'instant results' with his Fat Blaster Powder, 'I'm NOT busy! I'm lazy, sleep deprived and emotionally exhausted you moron!' Now that's a sales pitch I'd love to see on morning TV.

Image sourced from here.