The way we view free time is making us less happy

Equally, the way we chase top-notch leisure experiences has made recreation more stressful than ever. High expectations may clash with our experienced reality, making it feel anti-climactic, while trying to concoct the best vacation or leisure experience ever can fuel performativity.

He recommends using mindfulness to help savour leisure experiences. “It expands your subjective perception of time (i.e., you feel like you have more of it) and enhances memory formation, which means you’ll not only feel like your vacations lasted longer, but you’ll remember them a lot better.”

Two-thousand years ago, concepts of work and leisure were associated with servitude and freedom, respectively. In Ancient Greece, explains Aeon, most of the labour was outsourced to slaves, while wealthier parts of society pursued other activities. “Leisure was an active state of mind. Good leisure meant playing sports, learning music theory, debat... See more

“our ability to purchase and enjoy goods and services has risen much more rapidly than the amount of time available for us to enjoy them”. This pressure manifests in our decisions. “We feel like we want to have the best bang for our buck and minutes,”

“This means that those who complain the most about not having enough free time are wealthy and educated.” That fuels the idea that we must maximise leisure’s ‘hedonic utility’, or enjoyment value, when we actually do get some time off – and make every hour count.

Participants from India and America, both nations with overwork cultures, endorsed the belief that leisure is wasteful more strongly than participants from France, which has social norms, “less restrictive of enjoying life and having fun”. In fact, while Malkoc estimates about 30% of the population endorses the ‘leisure is wasteful’ belief on avera... See more

the way we perceive and value leisure has changed, problematically.

just like a traditional resume, where we show off our best selves, this experiential CV can become a breeding ground for competition. Keinan believes social media exacerbates our focus on productive leisure. Referencing a 2021 research paper, she suggests people are pivoting to signal their status and accomplishments in alternative domains – in thi... See more

By working through our experiential checklist instead of seeking simply to enjoy the moment, she writes, we build our “experiential CV”.