On Saturday night, I saw Keith Urban in concert. One of my favourites of his songs is Wasted Time. It’s a song that reminisces about the lost days of youth and days spent just hanging out with friends.
When I hear that song, I’m taken back to my teenage days. I have vivid memories of lazy days by the pool, at the beach, or just driving around in the car. One especially vivid memory is of several of us lying on the floor in my friend Christina’s living room late one night. We were staring at the stone fireplace mantle and imagining shapes in the multi-coloured stone.
Wasted Time Has Disappeared
Flash forward to 2024 and that type of simple unstructured “wasted” time has all but disappeared. These days, when you see groups of young people—and even older people—together, chances are they’re engaging more with their smartphones than with each other.
In Do We Have a Loneliness Crisis? I wrote about a talk I’d attended by Jeremy Nobel, author of Project Unlonely, where he discussed the loneliness crisis in our world today. I just finished reading Nobel’s book and was intrigued by a chapter called “The Ubiquitous Smartphone” that addresses the implications of the ever-present smartphone.
Dr. Nobel says the rise of the smartphone has essentially removed downtime from our lives. It has created a sense of urgency where we feel we need constant stimulation.
Instead, the phone has become an enabler of impatience with being alone with our thoughts. We have trouble being bored.
Jeremy Nobel, Project Unlonely
The book cited a 2019 study by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics where 82% of adults reported they had spent no time relaxing or thinking in the previous 24 hours. That simple quiet, creative time has been replaced by mindless scrolling. Dr. Nobel believes the biggest downside is we’re missing out on the benefits of daydreaming and the creativity that comes from unstructured time.
This lack of downtime affects us all, but it’s especially problematic for children and teenagers. After studying hundreds of thousands of creativity tests over the last 50 years, Psychologist Kyung Hee Kim found that, since 1990, children have become less imaginative, less humorous, and less creative.
You have to wonder how our children will remember their youth. I fear the nostalgia of hours wasted scrolling through a cell phone will never measure up to unstructured, wasted time and time spent just being rather than being constantly overstimulated by buzzing and pinging phones. I’m fairly certain it won’t inspire a catchy, hit song like this one.
Ain’t it funny how the best days of my life
Was all that wasted time?– Greg Wells, Keith Lionel Urban, James John Abrahart Jr, Wasted Time
Perhaps we all need to challenge ourselves to turn off our phones and build some wasted time into our days. Who knows what kind of creativity a few minutes spent daydreaming will inspire?
Do you set aside time in your schedule for daydreaming? Drop me a comment below and let me know.
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Beautifully captures the essence of nostalgia and the profound impact of technology on our everyday lives. It’s a poignant reflection on how the simplicity and creativity of “wasted time” seem to have dwindled in today’s smartphone-driven world. Your personal memories resonate deeply, reminding us of the importance of unstructured moments for creativity and reflection. It’s a thoughtful call to action to reclaim those precious moments of daydreaming amidst our busy lives.
Thank you! I think there are so many benefits of unstructured time, especially for children. There just isn’t enough of it.
I’m with you, Michelle. Those glimmery memories from childhood stick with me because they were so open-ended and glorious. Summer makes me nostalgic for all of that — and I love your deep memory of seeing images in a stone fireplace. See what’s there that we might miss. And you remember, years later. Love it! 🥰
Thanks Vicki! It’s interesting how those memories are so vivid. I still see an image of a “bird” from that fireplace even 40 years later. Have a wonderful week. 🤗
You, too – you, too! 🥰
I met Keith when I worked in country radio and he is truly a wonderful guy. He has written some amazing songs, but I am unfamiliar with this one because it was released long after I got out of the business.
This song hits me in so many ways. I would say 60% of the stuff I wrote about is connected to nostalgia in some way, shape or form. I will have to feature this song on my page soon. It’s fantastic. Thank you for sharing
Aww, I love to hear that Keith is a great guy. That’s definitely the impression I get from seeing him in interviews and on stage, which is refreshing in a world of overinflated celebrity egos. So glad you enjoy the song. It’s one of my favourites for sure.
I find that when I’m bored, my imagination takes flight. 🙂
Exactly, Maria! We need to allow ourselves to be bored and open up our minds to the creativity. It’s sad that this is a lost art.
Ah, thanks for reminding me of my youthful days of hanging out on the back porch alone, staring out at the rooftops of neighbors and watching the trees blowing in the breeze. That non-activity gave me pause to wonder about whether I was wasting time, daydreaming, reenacting the “lazy” moniker that my family had hung on me in those days, or check all of the above. The youth today will never have an inkling of what they’ve lost. How very, very sad!
Yes! Another thing we used to do was lay in the grass and watch the clouds go by. We saw all kinds of shapes in them, too. It’s interesting that we have so many vivid memories of those days.
Thanks for reading, Julia!
Great post Michelle and good reminder!
Thanks Parisa. I think it’s a reminder we all need from time to time.
Life got really busy in the past 20+ years, we don’t really have time to “waste” anymore. Too much of a technology..
That’s true to a point, Cristiana. Especially in the workplace. However, I think we need to step back and ask ourselves if all the time we spend on technology is really improving our lives and if it’s really necessary.
I totally agree with you, spending too much time on technology is of no good to us. We shall remember that more often🙂
We feel compelled to be busy and productive and then we lose the precious essence of being alive. May be we need to re-brand “wasting time” to something special that draws attention to how vital it is to living a good life?
That’s an excellent point, Caroline. For me, it took a cancer diagnosis to make me slow down and step off the treadmill. Perhaps we need a bold company or organization to mandate “creative time” and study the impact.
Thanks for bringing this up, Michelle
Good Times …
Yes, yes! A thousand times yes!! I have long looked for chances to show my home kids and my classroom kids that they can use boredom to stretch their brains and expand their creativity. As adults, we know ‘how’, but we often choose not to. I fear that younger generations don’t know ‘how’, because they grew up with handheld technology and rush to it when they are bored.
That is so true Gwen. I think younger generations have never had the experience of downtime because they are constantly overstimulated. It’s a shame because they are missing out on so much.
Ah, I love how you describe the benefits of wasted time, Michelle. It reminds me of something that author and psychiatrist Scott Peck said – it was along the lines that the reason he got so much done was that he spent 2 hours a day doing nothing.
That must have been a fun concert!
I love that bit of wisdom from Scott Peck, Wynne. And it’s so true.
Yes, it was an excellent concert. All the more special because I got to enjoy it with my two daughters.