When it comes to time is spontaneity political?
Posted by Lee-Anne Ragan | Filed under Change management & wellness, Communication, Travel
Having recently returned from working in Africa I’ve been thinking about time. A lot.
In my last three posts I wrote about a great Utne Reader article called Our Schedules, Our Selves: Are you more important than your appointment book? by Jay Walljasper, Stephan Rechtschaffen’s article called How to expand time and Lynnika Butler’s article about Living on Tokyo Time.
Another article about time in the same Utne issue is Leda Dederich’s one called the Politics of Spontaneity.
Having an altered sense of time since coming back home the title of her article hit me like the -20 degree weather I recently experienced while skiing. With a sharp intake of breath I read on.
Leda writes about having to “fight the magnetic pull toward overcommitment and speed”.
Right on. My neurons, pleading for a slower pace of life are shaking their biological pompoms.
Writing about her experience coming home after an extended international trip, she continues by saying “I’m-not-going-to-schedule-every-minute-of-my-life experiment feels like an act of personal resistance to a social system that values efficiency and production over the body’s natural rhythms”.
Since when was it political to be spontaneous?
Since we’ve been cutting, calibrating, slicing, dicing, shaving and saving. All in the name of time.
I recently had a wonderful long distance video chat via Skype with moxy, maven colleague Dyana Valentine. When it was all over I wanted to do it again.
I resisted the urge to schedule another call. We agreed we’d talk. Some time.
Tags: africa, change management, dyana valentine, Jay Walljasper, leda dederich, lynnika butler, overcommitment, politics of spontaneity, rps, skype, stephan rechtschaffen, time, tokyo, utne reader
December 10th, 2009 at 2:46 am
“The Personal is Political” Carol Hanisch
December 10th, 2009 at 10:22 am
Hi Lee-Ann. Time . . .being in the moment seems to sit well with me today. So many deadlines and a whack of roles . . .plus the minus 28 (but it’s a dry cold!) I was waiting for a flight from Toronto to Ottawa after TIME consuming delays and weather muck ups . . as I waited there was a monk in line with me. We sat and talked . . his words were very helpful. Think about the delays, it does not change, don’t think about the delays, it does not change. Choose not to think (worry) about it. I gave it a shot and felt time and stress stand still.
December 11th, 2009 at 12:47 am
Which underscores how our personal take on time is political.
December 11th, 2009 at 12:50 am
Hi Bill- your experience sounds predestined in a lovely sort of way. While I definitely don’t believe everything can simply be ‘thought’ better, the power of how we think about things, define them or not define them is quite strong and stark. Hope your flight went smoothly. I find flying quite the accordion for time; expanding it in the most delightful ways. Your story also reminds me of one of my favourite sayings – ‘if you can’t fight and you can’t flee…. flow’ (from a book called ‘as above so below’). Love your link too between time and stress. Hmmmm much to ponder. Thanks for your insight.