H.U.G Corner: Thought of the Week- 5/4

Quiet Mind: One-Minute Retreats from a Busy World (David Kundtz)

“‘These are the days of the time famine’, says Odete Pollar in her newspaper column aimed at helping people work smarter. She cites some interesting statistics. According to a Harris survey, the amount of leisure time enjoyed by the average American has shrunk 37 percent since 1973. In the same period, the average work week, including commute time, has jumped from fewer than 41 hours to nearly 47 hours, and in some cases up to 80 hours a week.

I like the term time famine, and starvation is certainly an appropriate analogy for our situation. Many of us are starved for time and we have a passionate desire to be fed. We are starving for those moments of solitude when we can just hang out, cleaning out a drawer or looking through old letters, with no pressure or guilt. Our starvation deprives us of the nutrition that those in-between times used to give us: a feeling of centeredness in our lives, of awareness of our spiritual needs and those of our families, a confident sense of self-knowledge.

Georgia O’Keeffe’s words ring authentic as you look at her paintings of flowers. She spent many hours ‘doing nothing’ with a flower. No time famine for her. Her artistic life in the desert was a statement against that idea. And we continue to benefit from the results.

In a famine- at least in the best of situations- those who have help those who have not. Thus a questions presents itself: Where are you in the time famine, among the haves or the have-nots? Sometimes one, sometimes the other?

For the have-nots: Today, stop and really look at a flower.

For the Haves: Help someone else to do the same.”