The concept of busy is a peculiar one indeed. We tend to spend most of our lives running around, doing tasks we don’t want to do and are even less qualified to perform, all so we can look at our friends and family and say, “I am so busy!” But why do we do it? Why do we fill our days with repetitive job after repetitive job? What are we trying to prove?

We toil in the factories, scurry around madly in our cubicles, all in the name of keeping busy. It is what we are supposed to enjoy doing, but far too many people curse the long hours, the low pay, and the similarily-attituded coworkers. In this day and age, finding a job that we love has become the oddity; not the norm. Personal satisfaction has been replaced with gloating about our overtime hours.

And things are no better in the home. We can’t content ourselves with watching TV or enjoying time with our families. Busy must take precedence. We must putter in our gardens, tinker in our workshops, and do our homework. God forbid that we actually take a moment for ourselves! Every minute of every day, we constantly spin, another standardized part in the machine, toiling for some greater purpose that, really, none of us know of.

It’s all to give the illusion of importance and the image of greatnesses. “I am Bill Gates and therefore quite busy.” We all want to be the star, but we’re all just extras in the background. And longer hours at the office aren’t going to accomplish that.

We are always told about finding what we are good at and spending our lives in that job. But, as my father once told me, people can be very good at things they hate. I can imagine no more terrible fate than choosing to do something simply because you’re good at it.

When I was a kid, I used to love playing Golden Axe. A classic arcade game of barbarians, demons, and dragons. You could ride dragons! I dropped a lot of quarters into that game. I was horrible at it. I could barely make it past the second level. But I could think of no better way to spend a Saturday afternoon.

So how come we don’t play Golden Axe anymore? Why do we spend year upon year…bagging groceries? “Sorry, can’t go see a movie tonight. They need me down at the store.” That is a lie. They never need you down at the store.

We, as a society, have been lying to ourselves for far too long. No company needs us to be there. They were marching on long before you got there, and they’ll be marching on long after you leave. With that in mind, why do you need to keep heaping work on yourself for them? To be busy?

Well, forget it. Society’s not going to grind to a halt if we all call in sick to work and spend a day for ourselves, doing what we love. Play with your kids! Watch TV! Just lie on a hillside and watch the clouds drift by. Doing what we love should be the norm. Keeping busy should be the oddity.

Now, I’m going to grab a roll of quarters and go play Golden Axe.