Note: This article is based on the work of psychologist Perpetua Neo, who tells us about her experience in making the most of free time.
Considering our free time, a waste of time harms our mental well-being. The study says that even without alternative plans, these individuals still do not enjoy unproductive leisure activities and generally don't find much fun in their lives.
Although we need between two and five hours of free time per day to achieve optimal performance, the problem with free time for those who aspire to achieve it is that we do not know what to do during this time, and we believe that we have to be productive all the time.
Of course, just asking a person who is looking to achieve his goals to enjoy his time and force himself to engage in some relaxing activities that are enjoyable for others would be like asking him to make a radical change in his personality.
But there is a way to live with that beautiful and comfortable feeling by being able to organize time between leisure and achievement times.
Strategies if you want to make the most of your free time
1. Take advantage of free time to achieve goals and objectives
You are supposed to spend your free time with leisure and entertainment, but you can start using this time to turn the recreational activity into a goal or purpose and discover what this activity can help you with. Maybe it matches your goal of getting better physical health, or you are exploring beautiful places to improve your photography skills.
If you enjoy a particular activity and discover that you enjoy other activities as well, it will make it easier for you to prioritize your free time. Human beings are a little more complex than having individual motives, feelings, or benefits from something.
2. Curiosity to discover how others spend their free time
You might be curious about how your friends, neighbors, or colleagues enjoy their free time, and if that curiosity is tiring, what does curiosity about other cultures look like? In the aforementioned study, the researchers found that people from India see free time as a waste of time, identifying it with a diligent work ethic and economic necessity, while the French were the exact opposite. So you might be wondering what you would do if you were in Paris to take advantage of your free time.
3. Expect the worst to happen
Our brains love to imagine disasters, and they think what they are imagining is real, especially when we are in the process of imagining, but they are abstract fears where they embrace a life of their own. The only trick to overcome these ideas is to confront these fears and ask, What's the worst that could happen?" You'll realize that the world doesn't end if you take a 20-minute walk in the middle of the day. You may find that this activity will help you make better use of the time in your day.
4. Consider entertainment an essential part of your life
Many competitive and workaholics see sleep as unnecessary, but the science of sleep disagrees. In addition to helping your cells repair and regenerate, sleep removes unwanted information from your brain, integrates information, and promotes memories. It also provides a safe space to treat trauma and is just the beginning of a very comprehensive set of sleep functions, which are certainly not redundant benefits or time-wasting.
We only learn to respect sleep as a basic need in our lives, but what if we can respect leisure time as a basic need as well, which is no less important than sleep?
Taking breaks is about spending time and restoring peace of mind. This pause in action helps us to strategically plan and respond wisely, rather than triggering reactions of anxiety and fear. In addition to the role of entertainment in caring for your most important relationships, taking care of your body, and investing your curiosity to search for other aspects of life, the more areas of life we dive into, the more experience and creativity we have in them. Not to mention that rest or free time (meaning, non-work) activates our brain, which is very necessary for the flow of creative ideas, whether to find solutions or new ideas.
While many people fear becoming lazy or messy during leisure time, the fact is that for many people, it will take a lot of training to be able to benefit from its pleasure.
Practical Ways to Organize Free Time
1. Doing the activities you love
While “unproductive” leisure activities without goals are often going for a walk with friends, sitting on the beach doing nothing, or watching TV, maybe we should try these activities differently.
For example, do you watch shows you love (and even learn from them), or is it just mind-numbing? If you watch a show that you enjoy with others and then discuss its content during a meal later, this means that you have obtained many benefits from it. You may also not like sitting on the beach, so walking or hiking may be enough to enjoy the beauty of that place.
When it comes to the friends you spend your time with, they may not be the right partners for you. There are friends we wouldn't have in our current state, and that's fine, but make sure you enjoy this time with them instead of spending it worrying and fearing.
2. Make sure your life pace is in harmony
Some kind of person suffers from a lack of patience, and for them, the idea of spending six hours at a barbecue with friends can be a terrible waste of time, so you can agree with them to spend two hours instead, or take a walk and chat for 45 minutes, instead of sitting for a long time without doing anything useful.
3. Develop your skills
If you have difficulty getting rid of poor productivity, maybe you need to master skills in your spare time, and if you feel good when you are progressing in a game you play, why not prepare skills as such?
4. Compulsory free-time experience
Even if I am good at ignoring my phone, there is always that silent inner urge that subconsciously forces me to return to it. The only time I cannot touch my phone is when I am forced to because I am busy with a massage or skin care session, so I always give myself forced breaks where I literally can't get close to it.
Another way I encourage some of my clients to spend their free time is to get the responsible person within a group of friends—who often manages all the group's activities—to tell his friends that he has free time every Thursday, for example, between 6 and 10 pm, during which they can decide activities and he'll be there with them."
Some of our friends enjoy being in a position of responsibility, while others hate to think about what activities to do, so it's a win-win.
5. Find fun times
Even every productivity-related workaholic has the incentive to stop working for a while and smile. An incentive beyond just browsing the phone. This motivation may be just watching your dog dance while he is lying silly on the back, seeing your cat walk towards you and purr, or playing with your smiling child.
In Conclusion
Leisure time can be suitable for everyone if you integrate it well into your personal and professional life and goals, and it may be strange and difficult for some people to start this new lifestyle. So start with it by taking small and careful steps. Perhaps you will realize that the world will not end just because you accept and participate in an activity that you have been invited to and that you will love this fun and partnership. The important thing is to take your first steps.
If you share this with people close to you, then thinking together with other activities will be a fun and useful exercise for bonding, and you can even ask yourself the following questions:
- What did I like about this activity I experienced, other than the goals I was achieving?
- Was there anything new, joyful, or surprising about it?
- How can I include these successful experiences in my life?
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