“THERE IS NO WAY OF WASTING TIME BECAUSE WHAT ELSE IS TIME FOR EXCEPT TO BE WASTED?” Alan Watts

Some friends made me notice that I am very well equipped to face a quarantine lockdown during a group video call. Italy and other countries are in lockdown and people cannot leave their homes if not for very special cases. With many people working from home or not working at all these group video calls became a nice reality for me. It is usually hard to pin down friends on a phone because everybody seems to be too busy for that. Well thanks Covid-19!

I read a certain implication in those statements about my ability to comfortably be in a confined place with nothing to do for long periods of time. I suspect it has something to do with the fact I am very well versed in wasting my time. Maybe I am a bit paranoid here but this could likely link to my habit to spend a lot of it messing about on boats for no particular good reasons.

So yes, being forced to be home and not having important or socially valuable things to do does not scare me at all. I could go ahead and tell that this has always been in my chords and that wasting time is one of my many talents. Now that many people are forced to live this reality in first person I finally feel that my uncommon way of life can bring valuable lessons. Paradoxically it can be used for the social good.

Here are 7 ways to waste your time during a coronavirus lockdown for people who are forced home. To everybody else whose life continue despite this grave situation goes all my respect and solidarity, particularly to workers of public health systems in all capacities for spending so much energy to save as many lives as possible.

DAYDREAM

DISCLAIMER. Daydreaming is dangerous and can use up a lot of time and resources. Use with care.

First of all let’s be honest, everybody daydream. We may have different reactions to it, from shushing it away to complete abandonment. But when there is nothing left to do, when windows are shiny, dishes done, squeaky doors oiled and so on, there is a good opportunity for daydreaming. Daydreaming can be disturbing, daring, too exciting. But when you are in a safe space and with time on your hands it is nice to watch your mental television. At least I enjoy mine. Before smartphones it was my only resource against waiting in any line, and waiting has never been a problem to me. So relax grab some popcorn and let the show begin.

CLEAN

Have you noticed that when you spend more time home, the house gets dirtier? Or maybe it is because the domestic helper is in lockdown as well and working from home is not very useful? Maybe only boats require constant cleaning and you are sitting in a spotless home with no cleaning chores. Although I spend a good amount of time cleaning I am not a pro and it seems things never get clean. I know some tricks passed down from family and learned from various online videos by expert cleaners but it is not enough. Lockdown seem like a good opportunity to step up your cleaning game, or to learn how to make yourself like tidying up, because you need it more than ever.

COOK

We tend to make sumptuous meals only when we have somebody to impress, like a new date, a group of friends or coworkers. Why is it so? Because cooking takes time, especially if we are trying something new or going for multiple courses, and there is nothing better that share a delicious meal with people. During a lockdown time is not an issue (provisions could but this makes for extra creative challenge) so I see no excuses for not cooking. Living alone or sharing the house with a small family is an opportunity to treat yourself more often than usual. I have many memories of cooking the most delicious food just for myself. I often regretted not having anybody to share it with but the culinary joy nonetheless invaded my tongue and body. I remember a peculiar one. I had just finished a trip with guests on a sail boat in the San Blas Islands. I had some tomato sauce I cooked fresh caught lobsters in the night before. An indigenous fisherman sold me a giant red crab for 5$ while going home from fishing. With those ingredient I concocted a Crab and Lobster red sauce I poured over spaghetti. It was two to three star Michelin restaurant worth. This memory still gives me joy. Cooking can at times be considered an art so check the next way of wasting time to know more.

MAKE ART

Another activity that does not require a public is art. It may sounds strange but you don’t necessarily have to show your art. Why very little people see what I draw? It takes me maybe an hour just to draw a face if I try to make it right. And the result is still quite ugly. The ongoing trauma of growing up with a truly genious sister who graduated in Illustration and Design makes it even harder. So I don’t share my drawings but I do draw when I have time. It takes very long to create something very basic when we are not competent in an art. Many of us have unfulfilled passion or dreams because it’s hard to find time for it. Please thank the Covid-19 for another opportunity and get going with your creativity.

LEARN

Nowadays resources for learning are basically infinite and free. I am pretty sure there is always something you wanted to learn but never had time for and many education providers are offering online resources for free, for both solidarity and marketing reasons. It is an opportunity to take advantage of because learning takes time and effort and we are usually short on those in non Covid-19 times. I am currently studying Celestial Navigation because I want to get an upgrade of my current sailing license. I am glad I have time to do it, rather than trying to study while having a job, and falling asleep on the course.

SOCIAL CHANGE

Homo Sapiens is often called “the social animal”. This definition always show up in scientific works on human behavior and biology. Lately in human history it appears that our sociality became a great problem for the system which supports us. Many understood that and tried to course correct our behavior acting on the institutions that oversee it with very little success. Movements, activism, ideologies and political theories all failed to slow down our innate frenzy despite being armed with the most obvious and self evident truths. The Covid-19 an invisible short sequence of genes inside a protein shell was able to slow down the economy, grind to a halt air traffic, decrease pollution, and convince many businesses that smartworking is a viable way of conducting transactions and get things done. I find this pretty remarkable. There is an opportunity here and we are using it against our own will. The opportunity to learn from this forced stop. This could only happen if we see the benefits of this situation, instead of only crying out its downsides. The opportunity of Social Change is a present we get from a fellow microbe, instead of a brilliant idea coming out from our human mind.

MEDITATE

Never meditated before? Then you should know that meditating is a very good way of taking time off your long and boring day. The secret is to stop everything you are doing and make it even more boring. Bathe in your own boredom! Of course there are courses and tricks and classes ready available at no cost to learn meditation. Just look for it. If you don’t mind a little swearing here and there I kindly suggest this short guided meditation (10 minutes). It is easy yet powerful. I started leaning into meditation when I was alone on a boat in a tropical paradise (the same where the Lobster Crabetti dish happened). With some time on my hands I would sit still on the bow of the boat at anchor to watch the horizon. Now It is almost ten years that I try to meditate and even if it’s still hard to build a continuity in the practice you get nice presents from this very boring activity.

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THE BIGGER PICTURE

I had a vision during the meditation time I give myself every Sunday evening. I saw myself as a beautiful root, with many branches expanding rhizomatically into the universe. Each branch touched a person, a place, an object. Every point of contact was a relationship. Every relationship, even painful and difficult ones, had a mutual exchange of resources, a “do ut des”. This root of mine, this branch of Life itself, is extremely intelligent and it follow its principle of growth. I ended up thinking that as a branch I am not fundamental, I am rather expendable, and I become valuable for the whole if I develop my unicity so I can bring novelty to the system, if I do what I was conceived to do which is happening as we speak. At the same time when I am too old or if an accident happens I will disappear and make space for the new and this won’t stop things. It will create space for the new. The network will mourn and incorporate what learning I created then things will continue to grow. The same as when you cut a branch of a tree, there is pain but in the end it is not a big deal. Life goes on.

This thought made me feel nonessential and instead of being terrified by this perspective I felt a relief as I am able to pursue my own growth, I am free to experiment. The Covid-19 experience is not only confronting us with social distancing. It is making us face our own mortality. That’s why it is so scary and moves us from within.

It is certainly our duty to do everything we can to live a healthy life, this will increase our chances against any illness that would hinder growth. It means following the rules that experts are constantly studying to minimize the impact of this new disease. We are a distributed intelligence and should act likewise.

However there are moments when despite all our efforts death cannot be prevented. We are mortal beings even when we try not to think about it. The Covid-19 as many other deseases is killing people. Somebody’s mother, brother, friend or colleague will not make it. If not the Covid-19 something else will at a certain moment take life away from individuals. That’s why we should not panic, and enjoy the life we are having right now, even when it feels boring and when it goes against our own will. A free mind does not see any prisons

I suspect this vision came as I was working on the problem of trusting my own’s decisions. A little over a month ago I left a well paid job and moved across two continents to end up again in a small boat, bleeding money and having to figure out a lot of difficult problems that contribute little to the life of our species. I don’t let judgements clog too much my mental space, as often decisions are just the storytelling of actions that spring freely. However I do watch my own actions and receive feedbacks about them. Doubts sometime arise.

Learning that Life is intelligent and that I am just a branch growing on its path of unicity helps me letting go and trust my feelings and instincts. They keep pointing me in the direction of making this little boat safe and beautiful and to sail her across the Atlantic Ocean to rejoin with Sara, to visit new beautiful portions of this planet and enjoying every bit of it. If this vision does not happen for any number of reasons I won’t feel that I wasted my time.

Because I truly believe there is not such a thing.