In Praise of Wasting Time Quotes

“I believe that getting stuck is often an essential part of the creative process. And when we are stuck—if we have managed to escape the heave and rush of the world, if we have managed to secure solitude and quiet and space without time—then our minds can roam and explore and invent in unfettered freedom. But too often we dread being stuck. Especially our students and young people. We believe that if we are stuck we are failed. On the contrary, we should welcome getting stuck. We should embrace getting stuck. That's when discovery begins.”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“Somehow, we need to create a new "habit of mind," as individuals and as a society. We need a mental attitude that values and protects stillness, privacy, solitude, slowness, personal reflection; that honors the inner life; that allows each of us to wander about without schedule within our own minds.”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“I suggest that we should think of the time spent in creative thought, in quiet reflection and contemplation, in mental replenishment, in consolidation of our identity and values in positive terms--not as what it is not, but what it is. It is time to restore our psychological well-being. It is time to promote growth as human beings. It is time to unleash our imaginations. It is time to protect our sanity. It is time to understand who we are and who we are becoming. "Wasting time" engaged in the activities I've described is far from immoral uselessness. It may be the most important occupation of our minds.”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“Without downtime, we might not physically die, but we will die psychologically, emotionally, spiritually. In downtime, not only are we making sense of the events of the day, we are making sense of our lives. We are combing through the thousands of hours and days of our lives to find those experiences and thoughts that have personal meaning to us, that speak to us, sometimes in that quiet, whispering voice.”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“Invisibly, almost without notice, we are losing ourselves. We are losing our ability to know who we are and what is important to us. We are creating a global machine in which each of us is a mindless and reflexive cog, relentlessly driven by the speed, noise, and artificial urgency of the wired world.”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“It has all happened so quickly. Fifty years ago, the Internet didn’t exist. Twenty-five years ago, Google didn’t exist. While all this progress has been taking place, we have not been paying attention. (And how could we, with all the distractions?) We have let ourselves be pushed along by the wave of technology and prosperity without looking to see where we are going. Little by little, our world has been transformed. Little by little, we have lost the silences, the needed time for contemplation, the open spaces in our minds, the privacies we once had. We have lost the knowledge of who we are and what is important to us. All of it happening so gradually and compellingly that we haven’t noticed. It is as if we have gone deaf. And even now, most of us do not notice that we can’t hear anymore. We accept the world as it is.”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“Don’t we owe that young woman, and all of our children, a world in which their contemplative lives are valued and supported? Don’t we owe it to ourselves?”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“As with the destruction of the environment, no one intended to rob us of our interior lives. Each of us once swallowed that first bite of the wired world, then the second. Then we were addicted. Soon, we couldn’t remember what we had lost. Our children, of course, were born into the wired world, never knowing any other way of life. All this in the name of “progress.”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“For me the big questions about life are: 1. How should I live in the world? 2. Why should I live this way?”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“They draw strength from being alone while they create or explore new worlds. They need that aloneness. They have developed the habit of mind to accept and seek out that aloneness. Sometimes, they must push back against their society to get what they need.”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“It is the celebration of privacy and solitude. It is the willingness to follow one’s own thoughts. It is the indulgence of play and unscheduled time.”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“But too often we dread being stuck. Especially our students and young people. We believe that if we are stuck we have failed. On the contrary, we should welcome getting stuck. We should embrace getting stuck. That’s when discovery begins.”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“I would argue, however, that in most and perhaps all forms of creative activity, an unencumbered, unregimented, inward-looking mind is required at certain points—a mind that has unplugged from the wired world.”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“It is not easily summoned. It does not follow the clock. It cannot be rushed. It withers and fades under external schedules and noise and assignments. Rather, it lollygags along on its own; it sprawls in the sun, taking its own time. Divergent thinking is associated with play, creativity, and curiosity.”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

“[T]he truth is I write by ear, always with difficulty and seldom with any exact notion of what is taking place under the hood.”
― Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time