The Quest for the "Good Time"

Fun, fun, fun. Travels, cruises, tours. Surfing, beaches. Shopping, sumptuous dinners.

The quest for a "good time" lies at the bottom of lots of people's pursuit of pleasure. To escape work or the rat race. Even as a motivation for retirement.

After 40 years working in a bank, Mario and Marsha shared how much they craved retirement now. Now that their kids are all grownup, they felt free.

They looked forward to the leisure and "inheritance" of retirement pay. They said they'd spend their money and time in their hands traveling, and simply "doing nothing." That brief future together was what they'd like to be, especially in the present moment.

Then it hit them! In our session, Marsha was telling her husband, "I could not understand what's happening. We hurried to retire and relax, do what we planned. Why am I bored? Is something wrong with me?"

I'm reminded of the mother of a young son as he impatiently waited for Christmas to come. He cried, "I wish it were Christmas!" His mother, with her gentle wisdom, told his son, "With such wish, you will wish your life away!"

The whole problem with leisure or "good time" delusion is that it is deceptive. It puts your days in separate boxes. It presumes that a day is going to be more enjoyable and far different. It chops off segments of life as worthless because they're not your "wished day."

As a result of that, you find yourself kept from seeing or treasuring your present moment. You get bored. Weary of the pattern of your days. The leisure blinds you to the importance of the work you gave to earn it and the need to create new meanings in life as a whole.

Of course, we can enjoy the "good time." Have our days off. We can treasure it. But it's not meant to be the "goal of life." Creativity is key. We find excitement and energy when we know we're creating. Creating meaning in our days - not leisure - makes life!