I've just read an essay by
Bertrand Russel title "In Praise of Idleness" which I found really interesting, so I'm sharing it with you now (Unfortunetly the author is no longer alive, but its nice to see how long the problem has been progressing). I feel better having read it as I know I'm not the only one who thinks that as a society we work too much. And I dont mean like oh you worked an extra 4 hours of overtime last week, I mean like we work WAAAAY too much. like why should we work 40, or 37.5 hours a week as opposed to say 20 hours, or 10? So much of the junk we produce just ends up in landfills anyway, do you really need another cellphone to replace the one you just bought? Do you think you'll be satisfied once you buy the next one? As technology progresses we are working more, not less. This is the opposite of what should be happening and I blame the constant desire to accumulate more wealth, and things. I believe that as our efficiency increases we should not be increasing production but rather reducing the time we spend working and keeping production constant (or at most adjusting to demand), and spend that time instead expriencing life or pursuing non-work related dreams and goals.
One or more of the employers I've had in the past has often said "Your should work longer hours, you'll make more money" to which I would always reply "but when would I have time to spend it?" To which their response was always a look of utter confusion. He or she just really could not process that I dont desire money for money's sake, like seriously actually could not process the idea that a person existed who did not want more money, as if I was speaking an another language or claiming that 1+1=3.
Money is important, it pays your bills, feeds you, puts clothes on you, allows you to buy goods and services. But beyond that it doesn't help you. If you die rich or die poor you'll still die, you don't get afterlife points for the size of your bank account. I desire to earn enough money to meet my needs and to live comfortably (and possibly build up some sort of buffer for retirement in 40 or 50 years). I have so many fun chalenging projects I want to work on, but by the time I get home from work or school I dont have the energy or the focus to do them. Ironically working on these projects would also make me a better developer too. The things I love to do, and the things that make life worth living I can only ever do in small sometimes pitiful amounts because of the productivity obsessed X hour work week and our societies insane desire to constatly make more money.
We consume too much because we desire to constantly consume. Its not natural and I think its hurting us both individually and as a society. I beleive Agent Smith was painfully close to the truth in observation of our society, so I'll conclude with a quote of that observation.
"Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with its surrounding environment, but you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply, and multiply until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet. " [Agent Smith, character in The Matrix]
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