Paved Paradise

What is your “fullocity”?

Yes, you heard right. “Fullocity” is a word you have never heard before. But it’s very likely a concept that you are completely familiar with. In fact, I bet you are much more aware of your “fullocity” that you think.

What is “fullocity”?

It’s the measurement of your time consumed by everyday things. Chores, errands, dropping little Ricky off at soccer practice, the PTA meeting, meeting friends for Happy Hour, checking your email, work, work, work, work, work. “Fullocity” is the calculation that will show you something that you probably don’t want to see, tell you something you don’t want to know, teach you something you don’t want to learn: how much of your time is spent being busy.

Why is “fullocity” important?

Because in this country, we are always busy. We are always in a hurry. Because in America, we are overbooked, overworked, and overwhelmed. We are undernourished, but not underfed. We are tired, but wired. We are booked, but always bushed. Taking account of your “fullocity” will allow you to take account of your life, which is passing before your very eyes one minute, one day, one year at a time…..only those minutes, days and years are passing by faster and faster, and when you look back, you can’t remember what you were doing last week or last year. It was a blur, and you ‘booked’ through it!

We, as a culture and a country, have absolutely no idea how to relax. And I don’t mean watch a movie, stare at the television, hang out at a bar and drink, or run on a treadmill in a crowded gym. I mean relax, sit still, close your eyes maybe, and just be, just think, just turn off the world.

In America, we go through the motions of “life”, or what we have established as “life” here, the norm, the average day. We don’t take time out to just be, and we don’t do things that contribute to our growth as an individual, a person…..we don’t play with our children, play with our significant others, talk, be creative like paint or draw or write…..we don’t communicate face-to-face, spend time just enjoying the company of another, touch and kiss….we don’t read a book or go for a walk.

We multi-task instead of relax. I do it! I text two people, IM with another, check my Myspace messages, watch baseball, and listen to music all while I’m cooking and doing laundry. Am I totally ridiculous, or what? How often do I just sit and chill? Almost never!

How often do you? How often do you sit and chill? How often do you just turn everything off and let silence reign? How often do you just sit quietly and let your brain do what it wants? Take a walk? Read a book? Take an hour out to play with your kids, your siblings? Just sit and talk about life with your best friend?

We all need to turn off and tune in to ourselves and our loved ones, but first we need to realize how badly we are in ‘the shit’, how deeply we are in the pool. We need to check in with ourselves and discover our “fullocity”. Only then can we look around and realize that our lives are passing by and we don’t even realize it.

So what do I do now? What’s my “fullocity”?

Stop for a second. Sit down. Grab a piece of paper. Jot down your week. Each week, Sunday to Saturday, has 168 hours minus 56 hours for sleep (if you get 8 hours), and you have 112 hours in the week. How many of those hours are you on the go? Work: 40 hours. Sleep: Commute to work: 1 hr/day = 5 hours. Errands, chores, kids to soccer, ballet and piano lessons, hours spent mindlessly watching TV or playing Xbox. Add it all up. Now subtract and see how much down time you have. Do you have any time left?

Another way to look at this is to write down your schedule. Sun, Mon, Tues, Wed…..what are you doing? Write down your average week’s schedule or what you have planned for this week. Where is your down time? Do you have any at all?

Look at your list now. Is 4/5ths of your time spent in work and chores and mindless activities? Your “fullocity” is 80%. 2/3rds = 66%.

But why should I care?

Because time is precious, and we all really have very little of it. In a very real “I could die tomorrow” sense (consider that approximately 45000 American’s die on US highways every year), your time on this Earth is very limited. What are you doing with time? Are you doing anything to contribute to yourself as an individual or a member of the family, or are you in pursuit of possessions?

Take a look around you. We are all working our asses off to have a nice house, a nice lawn, a new car, a vacation, a new set of golf clubs, a big backyard. We are all running around like crazy to acquire possessions, stuff, things, crap that we don’t need because we think it makes our life better. We suffer from time poverty (“high fullocity”) because are suffering from inner (spiritual) poverty. We fill our houses with toys and our lives with distractions so that we don’t have to think or feel. Instead of appreciating the world, nature and each other, we are busy with things.

Is that extra $40 worth your time? Is it more important for you to provide a nice house for your family or for you to spend more time with our family? It’s very well established that Americans are stressed and unhappy about life in general, which means our way of life makes us unhappy. We work harder and make more money (GDP) than anyone in the world, but among industrialized nations our quality-of-life issues rank us near the bottom: health care, vacation, and other “perks”. We ALL know that buying things is not the path to happiness, and yet we work hard to buy more things that will maybe give us more opportunities to be happier. We “buy” into that lie over and over, and what’s worse – we know it’s a lie.

So, now what?

Now, take a long look at your “fullocity”, and decide if your growth as an individual, if your life, if your family is worth all that hard work, all those long hours spent in that cubicle, those hours spent queued up at those big box stores, grocery stores or gas stations, hours “killing” friends over your Xbox connection, hours making sure your lawn is green or your BMW is sparkling. Wouldn’t it be nicer to just go home and enjoy what you have? Wouldn’t it be more fulfilling to spend more time with your kids, your wife, you boyfriend? Wouldn’t it be nicer to just sit and relax and take some time to reflect and maybe figure out who and what you are as an individual?

Take back your life. Start by measuring your “fullocity” and taking back your time. Your free time is the only real freedom you have. And while you are at it, visit http://www.timeday.org/ to see what you can do to make your life more meaningful.

What is your “fullocity”? How will you change it? And if it wasn’t so high, what could you do to change your life or another’s?