Can we normalize doing nothing, please?
I work with kids. These kids are at my program before and after school, and then some of them have sports/dance/music sometimes all of the above before they finally go home, eat dinner, and go to sleep. Then rinse and repeat everyday, and games and more classes on the weekend, etc.
I’m all for extracurriculars, but this turns into the teen who is not only in the school play, but they’re on the newspaper, the football team, and seven different clubs. In college they take double the courseloads, and then once they graduate…what?
They work themselves raw because they arent used to downtime. They’ve been told they can always be doing something, and they don’t know how to relax. This turns into the adult that has anxiety because there’s nothing left to clean, the adult that desperately wants to watch that TV show but can’t force themselves to sit long enough for it.
Then they turn into the moms and dads who spend all their free time ferrying their kids to extracurriculars.
Like, these kids don’t know what downtime is? I told a kid I did nothing last weekend, and he looked at me like I was crazy. He asked what I was doing this weekend and I said “Probably sleeping, mostly,” and he actually gasped. Then he rattled off a bunch of things I could do, to which I had to stop him.
“No, you don’t understand. I plan on sleeping. I’m booked.”
“But you could–”
“Nah. I’m just gonna rest.”
It was as if I had said a bad word or something. I asked what he does when he gets sick, and he says he goes to practice anyway. I asked him what he does if he doesn’t feel like going, and he said he goes anyway. I asked when he takes time to rest, and he said when he sleeps at night.
Bring back lazy Sundays. Bring back Saturday morning cartoons. Bring back the idea of relaxing and soaking in your day before moving into the next thing. Bring back the right to breathe, the right to rest.
Bring back mental health days, and taking a break. Bring back taking a walk or watching a show or setting a timer to remind yourself to stop cleaning and relax.
If you’re running at 100% all the time with no time to recharge, then your battery is going to die spectacularly, and probably at the worst possible time.
Mood
Okay, I see what you’re saying. But it doesn’t have to be that way, I had so many extracurriculars when I was a child and teenager, I played volleyball, sang solos and in choir, I played on violin solos and in orchestra, I did theatre...now I’m in college, and yes, it was difficult to figure out what I should do with myself, and I thought it was a disadvantage that I am interested in so many things. But then I realized, I can do anything, and just because I choose something to study or I started career in it, doesn’t mean that it is for the rest of my life. I have such a wide field of interest and skills and I’m happy, and I can actually rest and relax. I don’t think that all of my extracurriculars affected me negatively. I’m not saying that you don’t have a point, i just wanted to share a different perspective and approach.
