Finding time to socialize isn’t about time

I’m on vacation. I’m maintaining a schedule though, up at 8 to go jogging, and I have a chart next to my computer at my defacto desk, the kitchen table, that gets marked off each day when I exercise, read, write, film, edit, make music, and if I stayed sober that day.

It also has a column marked ‘socialize’. I do tend to become a monk when given the option and it bugs me at the end of the day if I haven’t gone out and done something or hung out with friends. But only at the end of the day, only when the day is over and it’s too late. During the day I incessantly feel like I have to get things done before I can choose to relax or enjoy anything.

I can push myself through a bunch of projects in a day feeling great until after dinner when I realize the day is wrapping up and suddenly I feel like I wasted the day. And strangely it’s actually happening earlier and earlier in the day. I’m cranking out blogs, making movies, reading important books, exercising, usually all before noon and I guess because it’s become routine it no longer fills the desire.

I’m putting in some time to learning more different and difficult things on guitar to get a reward fix, as well.

My obsessive need to be working, creating, doing something that lasts, invades every aspect of my life. Why just talk to friends when we could be recording a podcast? Why just hang out when we could be filming?

I don’t see an end to this need to pile on value to everything I’m doing. It puts me in a detached mode more often than I think is gratifying.

That’s why socializing is on my chart. I know that if I do it too much I can’t enjoy it because I’m not accomplishing anything and I’m recognizing now that if I do it too little I feel the same way.


Singer/songwriter, jerk.

Posted in Pragmatism
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