In this timely and essential book that offers a fresh take on the
qualms of modern day life, Professor Alan Lightman investigates the
creativity born from allowing our minds to freely roam, without
attempting to accomplish anything and without any assigned tasks.
We are all worried about wasting time. Especially in the West, we have
created a frenzied lifestyle in which the twenty--four hours of each day
are carved up, dissected, and reduced down to ten minute units of
efficiency. We take our iPhones and laptops with us on vacation. We
check email at restaurants or our brokerage accounts while walking in
the park. When the school day ends, our children are overloaded with
"extras." Our university curricula are so crammed our young people don't
have time to reflect on the material they are supposed to be learning.
Yet in the face of our time-driven existence, a great deal of evidence
suggests there is great value in "wasting time," of letting the mind lie
fallow for some periods, of letting minutes and even hours go by without
scheduled activities or intended tasks.
Gustav Mahler routinely took three or four--hour walks after lunch,
stopping to jot down ideas in his notebook. Carl Jung did his most
creative thinking and writing when he visited his country house. In his
1949 autobiography, Albert Einstein described how his thinking involved
letting his mind roam over many possibilities and making connections
between concepts that were previously unconnected. With In Praise of
Wasting Time, Professor Alan Lightman documents the rush and heave of
the modern world, suggests the technological and cultural origins of our
time--driven lives, and examines the many values of "wasting time"--for
replenishing the mind, for creative thought, and for finding and
solidifying the inner self. Break free from the idea that we must not
waste a single second, and discover how sometimes the best thing to do
is to do nothing at all.
