Lazy Day

Apparently it was National Lazy Day today (there's a day for everything these days).  As I haven't been at work this week I was able to embrace it fully (and unwittingly, as I didn't see it trending on social media until I got home this evening).  The larger part of my day was spent on the beach doing very little, other than watching the ships go by.  Actually, this is the second day this week I've spent at the beach:  I was at a different one on Monday and ended up so relaxed I ended up eating an (over priced) ice cream.  I know I've harped on about my work situation quite a bit of late, but it is worth noting the difference it makes being away from the stress.  Not only do I feel happier, but also healthier.  It took a couple of days, but the tension has gone from my body, I'm no longer feeling anxious every minute of the day and I'm sleeping better.  Even the intermittent tinnitus in my left ear seems to have taken an extended vacation.  I'm still dreading going back on Monday, but it will only be for a week, before I take another fortnight off.  (An odd leave pattern, I know, but as taking three consecutive weeks off is nowadays frowned upon by management, it is the best that I can do).  Where we go after that, I really don't know.

But to get back to Nayional Lazy Day, I've said it before and I'll say it again: laziness is greatly underrated.  Increasingly, we seem to live in a world where everything has to be done yesterday, speed is supposedly of the essence and not a minute is to be 'wasted' doing unproductive things like relaxing, let alone sleeping.  The reality, of course, is that doing things faster doesn't mean doing them better.  Quite the opposite, it engenders more errors.  Indeed, a combination with this obsession with running around like headless chickens and lower and lower staffing levels, meaning that most of us are running around like headless chickens three times over to try and cover, simply results in stress, fatigue and, consequently, mistakes. The trouble is, though, that even when we do get free time, we're nowadays encouraged to use it 'properly' by running around doing 'stuff'.  Which simply isn't relaxing.  People have forgotten the simple joy of doing nothing.  There is nothing better than spending a day lounging around the house doing very little, or going on utterly aimless walks.  Such things are relaxing because you aren't trying to mirror the work experience by putting pressure on yourself to meet leisure-related 'goals'.   I find that the best days off I have are those which are completely unplanned: I just see what happens.  Sometimes it is nothing, sometimes it is something.   You never know.