The Benefits of Down Time

There are tremendous benefits to slowing down and embracing time alone. Those benefits apply to us individually and collectively.

What I read: “Disengage” by David J. Siegel. Published October 30, 2023.

During the past few days, I was deep into a bunch of commitments during a big event being held in Palm Springs, California from where I’m writing this post. My obligations to producers and my own projects kept me quite busy. I had a great time. But I was ready for some down time.

So, after a few days of nonstop activity, last night I decided to park myself alone at my favorite restaurant on the main street of downtown Palm Springs on their outdoor patio and enjoy a glass of wine, great dinner, and a good book while I watched the costumed Halloween revelers walk by on their way to the big celebration a block away.

It was glorious.

Many of my friends were elsewhere still partaking in parties and official and unofficial gatherings for the weekend. I chose to chill out alone. I needed to disengage and recharge.

When I mentioned I was spending the rest of the evening alone, some friends looked at me with upturned eyebrows that relayed their surprised. Alone? Really? With all these social options available? They assumed there was no other viable option but to continue to dive into the deep end of the socialization pool.

We are, it seems, obliged to show up – to be reliably present, available and legible – for our own good or for that of the collective.

…

Acts of disengagement are routinely met with scepticism, judgment and pushback in public discourse.

David J. Siegel writes in his article about something I’ve known for years. Sometimes disengagement in beneficial. Sometimes cocooning in whatever manner works for us refills our social batteries. Sometimes escaping the fray of the masses does us much good.

During the depths of the pandemic, I learned that I’m rather adept at disconnection. Yes, the isolation took its toll on me at times, but often it was also a relief, a respite from the comings and goings of my typical busy life. My instinctual predilection toward disengagement heightened during those many months and resulted in resetting my nature to value it even more.

The early period of the pandemic (which approximated in many respects a kind of general labour strike) gave some of us an intimation of what life lived largely off the clock can be like when much of what passes for work is suspended or slowed and we are afforded precious ‘little gaps of solitude and silence’, as the French philosopher Gilles Deleuze called them, to engage in worthy pursuits that elude us under normal circumstances. We found incomparable personal freedoms and new opportunities for enrichment and fulfilment in the cessation of many of our standard operating procedures.

Admittedly, I was still working in corporate life as the lockdown took hold and was already a mostly remote worker. Adjusting to full-time remote work life was easy and kept me busy and employed while many other people had to endure much rougher times. I was grateful for that.

Last year when the opportunity to disengage permanently from my longstanding job became available, I took it. The pandemic taught me yet again how much I value my alone time and autonomy. Time to oneself and the privilege of being able to decide exactly how to spend it was something I jumped at immediately.

I felt badly for those who had become comfortable with their home work life and were called back into an office. Hopefully companies will see the wisdom of continuing to promote remote work options where possible, but that’s a discussion for another time. Siegel also extols the virtues of remote work and derides the return-to-office mandates that defy logic except to assuage the fears of management desperately trying to fill their already paid for vacant office spaces. Siegel also suggests ways that workers can nudge employers into seeing the benefit of expanding remote work options.

When all is said and done, I believe history will unfold with an increasing number of workers being remote because the financial and human upsides will so clearly outweigh outdated managerial styles. Time will tell if that proves to be correct.

But this post is more about disengagement from life commitments and drudgery generally. Yes, we work much of our lives. Thus, it’s important to figure out ways to wrestle more control of our time away from employers and into our own hands. But the value of alone time itself is something all of us need to varying degrees whether to separate us from work or other life entrenchments.

If you are someone who values alone time, I’m sure you’ve experienced resistance from others to the concept.

When people are exhausted, disengagement provides temporary relief from persistent feelings of overwork and a blessed release from our enervating entanglements. What society cannot countenance, it seems, is prolonged disengagement, which tends to be conflated with civic apathy or indifference.

Often, we need a break from the onslaught of information that streams into our lives from our phones, laptops, and television screens. Perhaps our social energy levels have dwindled and we can’t stomach the idea of having to maintain a cheery disposition in another conversation we’d rather step away from for a while. Maybe we’ve been around a lot of people and we’ve had enough of that for a bit and need to regroup so we can jump back in later afresh.

Whatever the reason we need to disengage, it doesn’t matter. The important thing is that you should love yourself enough and value your own autonomy enough to make time in your life for whatever level of disengagement you require.

Another aspect of intentional withdrawal not often talked about isn’t just about the personal. It’s also about the collective.

But this isn’t just about seeking exit from the turmoil of a modern, connected existence, nor is it merely about recharging our batteries so that we can absorb yet more political polarisation, toxic social media or climate catastrophe. It is also about engaging in a social policy of degrowth as a corrective to practices that are taxing the planet, overheating our politics, and putting a strain on our individual and collective health.

As someone who has been wallowing in the data about the horrific stark reality of climate change that we’re experiencing and will increasingly deal with, slowing down also has pervasive benefits for all of society. Same for the rampant capitalism that has fueled so much of that climate change and environmental destruction. That capitalism and the associated hunger for power has also continued to spark political division that threatens the continuation of our democracy while squelching our civil rights.

There is a lot more to Siegel’s superb article, but I’ll let you read it for yourself. I will, however, leave you with this that suitably encapsulates why disengagement is so vital personally and collectively.

It is often only in the interludes that we come to realise just how much our busy lives are an active conspiracy against the very things that supposedly give our existence a deeper sense of meaning and purpose. Little interruptions of the usual can be an invitation to pause and reflect, a rare opportunity for the deep noticing and heightened awareness that ritual and routine often obscure.

Please read Siegel’s article. It’s excellent and the world be a much better place if everyone took the wisdom he delivers to heart. Let’s all slow down. We’ll benefit. The world will benefit. I hope you take a nice break after reading this post.

By the way, the book on my e-book reader in the accompanying photograph is Sea of Tranquility (paid link) by Emily St. John Mandel. It’s superb.

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