Free time, or a lack of a better term, idleness (I'd prefer to call it 'positive boredom'), is an essential variable for creativity. Days like these where I have to put my foot down and tell myself to abandon work, are days where my books are beckoning me to turn their pages, ideas waiting to be engaged and penned down, films waiting to be watched, time seeking to be spent in quiet contemplation and the soul wanting to express itself in all its authenticity. Days like these are those which we tend to downplay on their importance and dismiss as unproductive without realising the magic they hold. Idleness is frowned upon because it doesn't seem quite compatible with today's norms of productivity. But idleness can be productive if this temporary emptiness of the mind and letting go of the motions invites modes of expressions and ideas that would not come alive if we were to be constantly engaged without pauses. In idleness, we are letting our extraordinary minds wander. And when we let our minds wander, we are letting ourselves grow and letting our souls just, be.
Oh who am I kidding? I wrote a post previously on the importance of mobility. But going further than that, it is the social encounters that make up the foundation of human experience living under this same canopy we call earth and sharing this home alongside others. To the first moment babies acquaint themselves with the world, having the first touch, hearing the sounds of a laughter, whimper, sigh, silent smile, and modelling on the external world to distinguish safety from danger, right from wrong, norms from exceptions. It is the everyday social experiences of walking out on the streets and seeing people doing their own thing - the mother reprimanding the child, the young man awkwardly fishing his pockets at the entrance of the bus, a fragile old woman taking her time to walk up the stairs, the sound of aggressive haggling at the market. And then there are those two close friends insisting they each want to pay the bill for the other, a group of boisterous teenagers disrupting your ...
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