I’m embarrassed to say I don’t have a whole lot of hobbies. This past summer I picked up roller blading after watching someone confidently speed past me. I use the phrase “picked up” lightly as I haven’t roller bladed in about a month now and still don’t know how to stop. I enjoy doing it. It’s fun, challenging, and gets me outside. I have no real excuse as to why I have stopped, other than the fact that I am never bored. Every spare minute I have, I seem to fill with meaningless time on my phone. And the catch is, I almost always feel worse after.
We have the entire world at our fingertips. We can watch literally anything we want with one search. We can generate images and videos in seconds without being reminded of the costs. We can scroll for hours and refresh our way into a new universe anytime this one feels overwhelming or stale.
On top of all that, we as college students and members of modern society are encouraged to work around the clock. We attend classes all day to come home and do homework and study for our classes the following day. We are rewarded for thinking ahead, and with a ten week term, the next exam is almost always around the corner.
Even when you aren’t a college student, remote work and contemporary technology have made it possible to be an employee whenever, wherever. We create habits around checking our emails and always being ready to check off our next task. I personally am awful at letting tasks sit. I constantly tell myself the lie that if I complete this one task now, my future hours will be freed up. In reality, there’s always something else to fill my time.
All this to say, we need to bring back boredom and intentionality. Hobbies, skills, and deep conversations with friends and family can all come as a result of boredom. Some days, simply maintaining relationships feels too time consuming. I don’t have time to send a text, let alone call someone or write a letter.
All this to say, we need to bring back boredom and intentionality. Hobbies, skills, and deep conversations with friends and family can all come as a result of boredom. Some days, simply maintaining relationships feels too time consuming. I don’t have time to send a text, let alone call someone or write a letter.
This, of course, is not true. I do have time to write a letter, to roller blade, or to read a book. I have time to spend with friends and family, to cook a meal for myself, or to visit the Hoop House. The problem, for me at least, is not the lack of hours in my day, but the ways in which I prioritize and sacrifice what fills them.
In the spirit of Halloween, I encourage you to take the dark and looming journey with me into a place few of us care to look: our screentime…
There, not so deep within my settings, I find the place in which all the free hours of my day have gone. I’ve gotten better over the years, but I am still so disappointed to see where I spend the very precious time I have.
Not to be dramatic or existential, but the clock is ticking. I will graduate come June (professors willing), and the years of accessible resources and the forced proximity of friends will come to an end. Yes, I too am stressed beyond belief and pray for the day where I walk across that stage. However, I want not to wish, or scroll, the time away.
Today, I choose to face the beast who has eaten my time and take accountability for my feeding it. Much of time truly is out of our control. That is all the more reason to spend whatever moments we do have on something meaningful. Please join me in the resistance of spending time intentionally:
Recognize the value of your time: Take a few minutes to think about what you do when you have a spare minute. Do you immediately open Instagram or Tiktok? Do you lose track of time and end up regretting it?
Find out where the minutes go: Try documenting your day. How long do you scroll in the morning? At night? What are you doing in between each class or task? Are you tracking your screen time? If not, why? Try recalling what you’ve seen after being on your phone for a while. Do you feel fulfilled by what you’ve seen?
Decide how you’d like to spend your time: What would you do if you had unlimited free time (picture a really early retirement)? Is there something you’ve always meant to do but let slip by? What habits could you build? What could be truly beneficial to you when taking a break?
Be intentional about what you do: Think about how you can bridge the gap between what you do and what you’d like to do with your time. Try carving up your screen time, taking twenty or so minutes of it to put towards something that would feel truly fulfilling.
To connect it all back to our major theme, I believe that simply being aware of how you spend your time is an act of resistance. All this free time could be spent doing something good for yourself, other people, the Earth, or all of the above! Spending just half an hour in the Hoop House feels so much better for me than being on my phone. And if I’m being honest, that time wasn’t going towards an assignment anyways. Once I take a second to be present and grounded with the Earth, I can feel more confident about taking on all the other things that occupy my time.
We are not meant to be machines programmed for maximum efficiency. We are meant to be enjoying the life we live and being present for every moment of it.
Written by: Elli Tiesworth K’27, Environmental Stewardship Intern & Environmental Studies DSA
Larry J. Bell ’80 Environmental Stewardship Center
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