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Show At last we've come to that utopia where we can do ourselves a lot F N EIGHT-YEAR-OLD boy, who ordinarily enjoys : school and play, sat quietly at the window one Sunday afternoon. Suddenly his motherinterrupted his reverie with a sharp, discordant, “Don’t just sit there, Billy. Do something!” This cry—“Do something!”—is the injunction not only of one mother but of our entire civiliza- seriousness as a session of Congressshould be from confidence, And while competition in the spirit of throwing of confetti. \ * - ~~ To find yourtrue leisure, accept play for play's play is a wise, insight-giving restorative, competition to prove yourself completely violates and destroys true leisure. sake. But doing so, recognize that you can have a healthy mindin a healthy body only if you will let yourself loll for’“lolling’s sake, contemplate beauty for beauty’s sake, art for art's sake and, most important, life for life’s sake. Sin Two—tThe Search for Status and Approval tion. For although most of us are prepared to take our work seriously, we are not equally ready to 4take-our play playfully. Nor are we ready to accept leisure as an equal partner with work in the overall of living. : ‘et in this pattern, work and leisure go hand. in-hand. The very epitome of leisure, for instance, is sleep. And without renewing and refreshing be ends in themselves—as tee from intruding in your play that you must prove something about yourself, you betray chinks in the armor of your You may be the sort of person who lives for the approval of others. Instead of being “I’’-minded, you are “they”-minded so that your wholelife is ‘Sin Four—Underrating Contemplation If you are one of the doers of the world and have no use for the thinkers, this sin applies to you. It also applies to you if you run from medita- ‘ devoted to what “they” think about you and what “they” say about you. If you are a “they”-minded person, you will not tion as from a pang of conscience. True leisure can, in fact, take place only when yourself with sleep, you cannot work the next day. only want other persons to like you and to be Nor is sleep mere idleness, During these hours much goes on within, and problems that have gone unsolved by day are often solved in sleep. : So, too, is it with waking leisure, which, if it is popular—as we all do, more or less—but you will also feel that they must like you and that. you must \be’ popular at all costs! Then, too, being “they”-minded, you will be ambitious. Your goals, spiritual unbidden and unconscious rise up through the common.” For, when you are willing true leisure, becomes a time of refreshment, of however, will not be set becatise you want to do better but only because you feel that you ought to. opportunity to come face to face with yourself. renewal, and of the fruition of ideas begun and truggled over in work. . As Ogden Nash puts this universal dilemma, ving free time, however, does not assure “Modern man is suffering from hardening. of the any more than a doctor can assure oughteries.” Under such compulsion, a person subordinates allhis leisure time, as well as all his working time, to the aggrandizement of some external authority. you allow yourself the freedom of meditation. At such times, in the words of Van Dyke, “The to relax and to let come whatwill, you have the You haveto be willing to live some of yourlife in your inner world. You will find that you will have to rediscover in yourself the child who can respond with fresh vision to the world without and within. Discovering “thine own self” and the child you are, you will bring ‘to yourlife beauty, the capacity for marveling, and an inneractivity that His life consists solely of rendering unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s, or else in rebelling against Se it onde fod ante it best by trying to avoid these seven deadly sins against true leisure. “Sin One—Compulsive Competition _ This sin comes when you're all set for that wonderful weekend of complete relaxation. Perhaps you plan to improve your canasta, your bridge, , your swimming, or your golf. Whateverit is, you are ready for a little competition in the spirit of play and good fellowship. Playfully, you are pre-pared to vie with friends in: “Who can do this or _ that the best?” or “Who can run the fastest?” or “Who can climb the highest?” Suddenly, however, you find that you are trying too intensely to break 100 on the golf course. Your nerves have become taut, your feelings anxious. Unhealthily, you have exchanged a natural inclination to improve and express yourself for a compulsive need to prove yourself. Competition to prove yourself is a betrayal of the very spirit of true leisure. For once you show will enrich your existence. Caesar. But having no ears for his own innerself, Sin Five—Denial of Creativity e is inwardly dead. Are you perhaps abusing yourleisure by committing this fifth sin—this denial of creativity, which, in a sense, is the ‘result of the four pre- ds and the domination of the oughts. es.in relaxing his comms drives ceding sins? Your answeris important, for whatever your work, it requires at least a little of the intuitions and inspirations both from within, ~ $in Three—tThe Loss of Play for Play’s Sake You'll have to plead guilty to this sin when you find that you pervert a walk in the woods into a means of keeping your waistline down; a game of golf into a business conference; or an hour in creativity that only leisure can foster. - The plain truth is that the sudden grasp, the ecstasy of being able to say, “Oh, now I've gotit,” urs not during moments of striving to getit, ‘We you have relaxed yourefforts. ; gh achievement take place with the hammock into a conference about annuities, bathtub, Newton under the apple tree when they~acquired sudden—andprofoundinsights into worktat been absorb=-~ retirement plans, or even the need for a new lawn ing them for years. Poincaré experie! mowerorthelike. Accepting play for play’s sake in the spirit of true leisure, you will find that a walk in the woods, a gameof golf, or a swing in the hammock should ment of revelation and made his most p mathematical discovery when he was steppi onto.a streetcar. Yes, both from my work with patients and from |