Ways to relax without wasting time
When I’m not studying I find it waaaay too easy to “kill” my spare time by doing one of several things – playing stupid computer games, random internet browsing and watching daytime TV. Recently I’ve been making an effort to avoid those things and I’ve come up with a list of things I can do which are relaxing and fun but at the same time productive:
- read
- listen to podcasts
- write
- listen to music
- exercise
I think the key is to find something that doesn’t just use the time up but fills it. Obsessively checking e-mail and RSS feeds is not a time-using activity it’s a time-wasting activity.
September 9, 2006 at 6:55 pm
I have a list of things, too. I don’t worry about being “productive”, though. My list is just of things I enjoy doing that use spare time in an enjoyable, and possibly useful, way.
* Random, unplanned social time — drop in on a friend, call someone, with no agenda
* Playing cards (with others) or doing logic puzzles
* Walking, or riding a bike — with no agenda, once again
* Music or reading — concentrate entirely on the activity and ignore external events
* Share thoughts with others — by commenting on a page, emailing the author of an insightful post, writing a new blog post
* Meditation or breathing exercises — of which the only purpose is to foce yourself to slow down.
Hope this is useful (I’ll probably reuse some of the content in a future blog post.)
September 10, 2006 at 2:12 pm
Andrew – productive was probably the wrong word. Basically I just wanted a list of things I could do which weren’t just going to eat up time without actually achieving anything. Often after a one or two hour procrastination session on the internet I know no more than I did before hand, I haven’t done any work and for all the time I’ve wasted I have nothing to show for it. The stuff you’ve suggested fits right into that.
September 10, 2006 at 8:07 pm
[...] Way to relax without wasting time [...]
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