Hiding Behind Busyness
I Still Don't Do Well With Idle Time
It’s spring break and in the education world that means no work…for those who have a healthy work-life balance. I do not and so I’ll be working days during spring break. Partly because I am beyond overwhelmed with my new role, and I’m recognizing how that is all by design.
I have always had a dysfunctional relationship with time but the way I attach myself to the concept of busyness would make any psychotherapist salivate. I hide behind being busy. I always thought I hid behind entrepreneurship but that was just an expression of my tendency to self-isolate and martyr myself without having the luxury of a captive audience.
I don’t do well with idle time. The guilt of ease and the shame of wanting to enjoy a life leisure leaves out the part where nothingness is only fun when it’s a shared experience.
When doing nothing is a solo sport, the isolation becomes so loud that only busyness can properly distract from how lonely it feels to be alone by yourself.
I wonder if this is why I stay at my traditional job. For years, it was easy to fall into the hole of being socially awkward and claiming that identity to justify having so few genuine connections. I know people but I don’t really know people to the extent that I would consider them beyond an acquaintance.
The few people I consider friends don’t expect me to perform friendship for them. They don’t treat me like a commodity and bounce once I am no longer doing something for them. They accept my presence for the sake of presence.
Work friends that tether the “work” as a condition for the friendship are not on the same level as those who would help be burn some shit down. And yet I exhaust myself with “work” and delude myself into thinking that I have a purpose which requires the exploitation of my generosity and loyalty.
I keep myself busy so that I can feel needed. I embrace overwhelm because it feeds the narrative that I have value because if I don’t make myself indispensable that I am actually dispensable.
All of this is a ruse to disguise the fear of visibility and keep me small enough to be acknowledged but not small enough to go unnoticed. And as I dismantle the ways I feel inadequate, I find myself surround by people who are comfortably settled in staying small and I don’t know how to manage that disconnect. I wrestle with the idea of ambition because it speaks to my trauma wounds and I am not ready to surrender what keeps me from going off the deep end.
Capitalism doesn’t allow for leisure or ease when you come from the projects. The only generational gift passed down is scarcity, as both a reality and mindset. As a daydreamer, the life I imagine feels so distant and I’ve worked my ass off to heal from the limiting beliefs that convinced me I didn’t deserve it.
I wanted to enjoy spring break but to escape a toxic supervisor, I left my position and took a 20k pay cut, or as I call it, the pendeja tax. So while I would love to sleep in for a week, I have to hustle to compensate for the lost wages by working double duty. Again, my woe is me party came as a DIY kit. I inflicted all of this sadness onto myself.
Through another lens, this hustle or die lifestyle is revered by those who celebrate busyness.
Sleep deprivation is considered a badge of honor by some. How often do we play the “I haven’t slept” game to see who compromised their health more? The race to the grave is a competitive sport and I was never one to enjoy losing. But as I get older, clarity comes more freely. Between the masters and rebuilding my business, having no downtime comes with a newfound respect.
I am not busy for the sake of distracting myself from the loneliness of life.
I am busy because I am trying to thrive despite the loneliness of life.