Busy-ness

My housemate Zarina forwarded to me a couple of articles dealing with the subject of busy-ness. With the fact that many in our culture are so very busy, and that this is an escape from actually being present in our lives.

When people (such as these writers) talk about busy-ness, what are they actually referring to? Having one's life scheduled in advance? Our lives are completely scheduled on meditation retreat, but we don't call that busy-ness. Is it better to have unscheduled time so that one can accept spontaneous invitations? One busy-ness commentator seemed to be suggesting this -- yet why were the spontaneous activities (having drinks with friends, for example) preferable to the activities his busy friends have scheduled (taking classes, political activism, working within one's career)?

It seems that one's life can be completely booked, yet one can still be present for those activities. Conversely, one can have a fairly open schedule, yet not be present for one's life.

I can think of two good friends who I think of as particularly busy. They are on the go from dawn until dusk. I do not know either of them to ever take what I think of as "down time" -- going about things slowly, letting the mind relax. They both seem to always be trying to accomplish goals, even during presumably relaxing social time. One, I think, has a character disorder. The other, I think, really loves accomplishing stuff, really values all the things that she creates -- yet, I do think that she, like the first, is uncomfortable just being with herself.

Lately I have tried to drastically unbusy my life. I have been accepting very few social invitations. I have been spending most of my weekends in a kind of retreat (perhaps going to the produce stand or the library, or eating meals with housemates while they converse and I stay silent, but mostly staying in my attic meditating, doing trauma recovery work, or doing hatha yoga). I want to really give myself a chance to experience myself, as much as possible -- not just one or two hours a day, but many hours a day.