Hooked on unfinished business - the fear of slowing down

Hey fellow Steemians, it's Rabbe again. Some of you might remember my article about people trying to fill their calendars as much as they can: https://steemit.com/life/@rabbe123/the-busy-life-filling-your-calendar-to-the-max

I thought this topic would be worth talking about a bit more, so this is a kind-of-sequel to the last one. This time I'd like to discuss something I think is one of the reasons a lot of people try to have as much to do as they can.

Artificial hurry to pass the time

There is a proverb in finnish that can be roughly translated to "You will never run out of work by working". What it means is basically that no matter how much you work, there will always be something waiting so you will never end up in a situation where you have nothing to do. The proverb is often used when someone is doing something all the time and you want them to take it easy for a while.

However, I think this proverb can also be understood in a different way. If you will always have work to do, that means you can always pretend you're in a hurry to do something or go somewhere. This is actually what many of us do these days. One can always say how this or that needs to be done and after that ten other things are already waiting. The one thing that's left unmentioned is that the things that need to be done are by no means urgent and could be left undone for days, weeks or months. But why would we say it, that would make us sound dumb wouldn't it? " Yeah I could do these things in the next few weeks but I prefer doing them now. Damn I'm in a hurry all the time."

The inability to handle the quiet moments

So why do we keep going and fill our days with tasks and chores that don't need to be done? Things we complain about but still do them all the time? Because it's still a better option than not having anything to do. It seems like we are almost afraid of not doing anything. But why?

I have a few guesses, first of which is boredom. It's a scary word, a condition one should avoid at all costs. Lucky for us, there are dozens of activities we can do to avoid it. What most of us do is pull out our phones and open Facebook, Instagram or whatever and furiously scroll through the posts. The question is, should we really try to avoid it?

What is boredom?

Our lives are filled with possible activities, so we can stay away from being bored. However, my opinion is that boredom only exists because people have so much to spend the time with. We don't have to get used to having nothing to do, so we never learn to cope with it. This in turn makes us avoid it even more and eventually result in an obsession to keep ourselves busy. But what would happen if you just let yourself fall into the abyss of boredom?

Of course it will feel weird at first, you hear your thoughts in a completely different way for the first time in ages. You might also start to notice all these weird feelings that you've been running away from. This is usually the point where we feel like we need something to do or we feel really anxious. But only by pushing yourself forward into it will help you over it. Once you learn to cope with it, you'll eventually start longing for those quiet moments when you can just think of stuff and let your mind and imagination loose. This can also be really productive if you learn to use it to your advantage.

So next time you feel bored, don't run away from it. See what happens if you just allow yourself to be bored. It will most likely be worth it. I personally feel like everyone should do nothing every once in a while, just to learn to work with it.

That's it, that's all. Feel free to disagree if you want to, it's completely fine. This is just my point of view as a guy who tried to run away from boredom for years but eventually found out it wasn't bad afterall. Until next time. Peace.
-R