Unfiltered Thoughts: Has busy become a Badge of Honour?

I was having lunch with a few buddies last week, and one happened to comment that, for once, I wasn’t in a rush to leave immediately after we ate. I laughed it off in the moment and didn’t think anything of it until a few days later when I was rushing in from a meeting to walk the dog. My daughter asked, “What’s the rush?”

That’s when it hit me. I’ve been rushing from one thing to the next without being aware that I’ve been living in a state of fast-forward. And to be honest, I can’t pinpoint when things changed.

I assume it’s because we are surrounded by things designed for convenience and speed – take ChatGPT, for example.

Need to write a backgrounder in a hurry? No worries. Plug in a few keyword prompts, and ChatGPT does your thinking and writing.

And it’s not just AI. Self-scanners at stores enable our need to check out faster with little human interaction. These conveniences reward us by getting us to the next ‘thing’ as quickly as possible while reducing the opportunity to slow down by connecting with others.

Our brains have been rewired to live in an always-on state, needing to be constantly busy. We crave being busy over downtime. We think we are interacting with one another, but we are so busy and rushed that we aren’t connecting in a deep and meaningful way.

It’s as though being busy all the time has become an addiction—a badge of honour.

The busier we get, the busier we need to be. And by piling it on, we aren’t just rushing through life, we are becoming desensitized to the importance of simple acts that are good for the soul, like stopping to say hello to a neighbour or ordering a coffee after lunch because the conversation with friends means more than what’s next on your to-do list.

Since my buddy called out my need to dash off from our lunches, I’ve become more aware of slowing down. I’m working on not always being on, and I’m learning to view conveniences like self-checkout as a way to save me time to do the things I want, like walking my dog and enjoying coffee with friends.

Be authentic. Be real. Be kind.

David