Art of Wasting Time

https://unsplash.com/photos/Dwheufds6kQ

An FB friend's post reminded me of this art recently. I hope Exequiel Nido is seeing this because he refreshed the idea that has been dormant in my mind and now am pondering on again. Hi Exeq! Long time! Well, it was way back grade school when I discovered how "wasting time" was really an art. You cannot do or appreciate it unless you have the imagination of a born nonjoiner.

For lack of a better word, I just call it "wasting time," and because that's what people who criticized me called it. "Choy, wasting time again staring blankly at nothing?" It's an accurate description but they fail to get the real meaning. Yup, I often stared afar looking at nothing, and actually seeing nothing but visions in my mind. Of course, I saw the things found in the distance but I saw the visions more.


Once, as a kid, I climbed up the window on the second floor of our old apartment and looked out as far as my eyes could see--the giant acacia trees lined up along Bonifacio Road bordering Manila North Cemetery and the huge, puffy yellow clouds on the horizon that looked so much like the dirty ice cream I bought from ice cream carts plying on the streets.

As I was watching this scene, I also saw in my mind visions of me, my mom, some cousins and an aunt along Bonifacio Road waiting for a jeepney ride. We were going somewhere while in a lively conversation. The vision became so real to me than the acacia trees and yellow clouds. I stared out the window like that a long time, listening to our "conversations," only broken now and then by my dad's voice asking what I was doing.

It's far from just laying idle. You're getting a hint of something, a mental vision forming right before you, and you need to be still and just watch quietly, allowing the whole thing to take place because it often ends later in an idea or tip-off or omen. One disruption--if you suddenly say something, for instance--and the whole thing may stop.

It's actually "work." Idling is doing nothing, no work whatsoever, and your mind probably registers zero activity if scanned on a neuro-monitor. "Wasting time" is productive because it creates new ideas or forms some messages. I guess only nonjoiners can understand this and benefit from the mind enrichment and stretched imagination.

The uninitiated will always see it as a total waste because it won't make them any money. To them, anything that does not translate to cash is waste. But there is more to life than make money and spend it. We need money--I need lots of it. But I need to "waste time" more to see what only a chosen few are allowed to see. Most folks fear being a nonjoiner--because only nonjoiners dare "waste time" for long periods and enjoy life more on a higher level.