No time for this or that

The thief of time

Someone once told me that ‘procrastination is the thief of time’. I can’t help but agree with that. Which brings me to two short stories. Last night I went to a networking group that I hadn’t been to for some time; years actually. At the end of the evening, I was admiring a photographer’s portfolio and he came to chat with me. It was a good selection of photographs and I complimented him on them. As things do on such occasions, the talk came round to books and his partner, a young lady, said ‘that she never gets time to read’. It’s a comment I hear a lot. I let it wash over me and we continued chatting.

Hiding in the toilet

Last week, one of my students (I teach martial arts as well), – a father of three – mentioned that the only way he can get any time to himself is to lock himself in the toilet with a newspaper and read it cover to cover. A close friend of mine remarked that her husband and son did the same thing. She said that she sometimes forgot the men of the house were in the house they were gone so long and then she’d hear the toilet flushing.

The nature of the thief

And yet, we know that pretty much everyone checks their social media. Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, the lot and how much time do we spend on them? Hours and bloody hours it would appear. What’s worse is that we know that the social media companies know how to hook us in. To keep going back for that sneaky peak, that piece of ‘news’ we might have missed or that rush of dopamine we need, to say ‘I exist’. And yet, so many people don’t have time to read.

It’s all down to this

Which comes back to exactly what we suspect. It’s all down to desire. Whatever you desire will get your attention. I read. I read a lot. Books, magazines, the back of cereal boxes, labels on sauce bottles, newspapers (if they are lying around) and yes, social media too. Because reading is important to me. Fiction or non-fiction. My desire for knowledge and the stimulation of my imagination. It fuels my brain in the same way that food fuels my stomach and exercise fuels my soul. My desire is to read and it’s got nothing at all to do with time.