Did you ever stop to wonder about what free time really is?

What does it mean to have free time?

After many years of wondering about my job, my career, my so-called free time, I kept asking myself -

is this about lifestyle, or about vacations and doing what I want to do?

Because we don't always do what we want all the time in our everyday lives - but does our routine have to be boring, hard-to-get-by or meaningless?

After a lot of thought, I've come to the conclusion that

free time is when you do what you love.

So people work nine to five from Monday through Friday in a job they hate so that they can enjoy the weekend... something's not right there.

Or they work 350 days a year so they can enjoy two weeks of "free time"... also not good. 

Not a happy life.

I'm sorry to break it to you if this sounds harsh, but if your job is not something you love, or if you don't love what you do...

love yourself more and do something about it.

The first step in this direction is to

know yourself - who you are and what your talents are.

Some people have talents that are not necessarily what they love to do.

It's something they're really good at, but they just don't love it and don't want to pursue it. For example, a person who's a natural-born musician and can play the piano beautifully... but doesn't like it.

So no one has the right to force her, right? Something we're really good at is not necessarily what we love.

It's a talent, so if we do pursue it, even if we don't like it, we can call that service.

And service is not necessarily free time, but it can be considered even more valuable than free time. In the long run, if you really want to think about valuable time, service is beyond free time. It's not sacrifice either - it's choosing to give the world the talents you were born with even if you don't love that activity.

With persistence, service and sharing talents becomes "loving what you do", instead of "doing what you love". Eventually, it becomes doing something you truly love - and people who serve with their hearts are doing what they love anyway.

So when it comes to service, I always think about this a “yoga principle”. It's not a traditional “yoga principle”, but I hear it a lot in yoga classes from different people, which is this idea of

“fake it till you make it”.

Which means if you don't know how to do a specific pose, try.

Keep trying. Don't give up.

And you will eventually master that pose - that Asana.

So “fake it till you make it” means:

don't give up on it and you will master it.

So when it comes to service, just the fact that someone is willing to serve, it's a little seed that will grow into a beautiful plant if we are persistent.

So to me, service can be understood as free time after we've mastered our egos and our resistance - and you become someone who loves to serve other people and help.

Those of us who are not willing to serve others in the best way possible, and those of us who complain, don't like their jobs, or don't like part of the activities that they do in their free time are not happy people.

So when we think of time, we tend to have very subjective relationships with it.

We have a specific understanding of biological time, another of generational time, another of emotional time. And the idea of free time as the opposite of the time you have to spend doing something you hate is just distorted. Instead, 

think about time as LIFE.

Because as Annie Dillard would say,

“How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives".

So there are some things we need to do that may not be very pleasurable, but if we add complaint, resistance, and stress to it, it's going to be worse. And it will not be the inevitable life circumstance - it will be our doing.

So the best thing to do regarding the activities that must be done is to just

embrace it and know that the positive outcome of our actions and the good results are worth it.

When it comes to your lifestyle and the time we spend in our work, job, or even building our career - it must be meaningful.

And there's a difference between a job and a career.

A career must be aligned with our life purpose - seriously.

A career is a broader concept than we may think. It's not just a professional thing.

Your soul's purpose may not necessarily be professional.

It could be being a Beacon of Light in your family. It could be being a wonderful mother to your children, or a wonderful father to your children. There are many life purposes we have as human beings, but when it comes to your time in your daily routine, if you complain too much about the things you have to do and can't wait for your “free time” to come by,

the idea of free time is actually telling you that your life is not that happy.

So to create a beautiful, happy, wonderful life, which we are all entitled to as human beings, and

to have joy in life, do something meaningful and purposeful every day.

Don't complain about the activities that must be done in order for you to lead an adult life, and think again about the concept of free time.

Try to substitute the idea of "free time"  for "love time" - activities you love doing.

It can be your work,and  not necessarily your vacation, right?

Let us know if you agree. Share with us on this topic in the Comments Area below.

And thank you so much for being here!

I will see you soon :-)

Much love,

Paola.