On Idleness

The present pandemic poses quite the philosophical question for every individual who wishes to get out of their bed, wishes to just glare away from the phone for a bit and somehow tell themself I need to be doing something productive!

A recommended reading for Idleness is How To Be Idle by Tom Hodgkinson. Tom is also the editor for The Idler.

A modern day Shakespeare would write something along the lines of these words:

To Do Or Not To Do, That Is The Question!

– Lil’ Will Shakespeare

As I went through some of my pages in my Journal I stumbled upon quotes from some of the most prolific, hilarious writers the English literary world has ever seen. Here are some quotes I jotted down.

“Doing Nothing Is Hard Work”

– Oscar Wilde

Ah! how delicious it is to turn over and go to sleep again: ' just for five minutes’. Is there any human being, I wonder, besides the hero of Sunday-School ‘Tale for boys’, who ever gets up willingly? There are some men to whom getting up at proper time is an utter impossibility. If eight O’Clock happens to be the time that they should turn out, then they lie till half-past. If circumstances change and half-past eight becomes early enough for them, then it is nine before they can rise. They are like the statesmen of whom it was said that he was alwaus punctually half an hour late. They try all manner of schemes. They buy alarm-clocks (artful contrivances that go off at the wrong time and alarm the wrong people)… I knew one man who would actually get out and have a cold bath; and even that was no use, for afterwards he would jump into bed again to warm himself.

– Jerome K. Jerome on ‘Being Idle’

Sometimes, when I set to thinking about the various activities of men, the dangers and troubles which they face at court, or in war, giving rise to so many quarrels and passions, daring and of ten wicked enterprises and so on, I have often said that sole cause of man’s unhappiness is that he does not know how to stay quietly in his room. A man wealthy enough for life’s needs would never leave his home to go to sea or beseige some fortress if he knew how to stay at home and enjoy it. Men would never spend so much on a commission in the army if they could bear living in town all their lives and they only seek after the company and diversion of gambling because they do not enjoy staying at home?

– Blaise Pascal

Whoever practises non-action,

Occupies himself with not being occupied

– Lao Tzu

Nichts erfordert mehr Geist, als nichts zu tun zu haben un trotzdem nichts zu tun

(Nothing requires more Spirit than having nothing to do and still doing nothing)

– Karl Heinrich Waggerl

I was planning to write something profound and motivating here but then I felt lazy and missed being idle. So I am going to leave it there!