Idleism
Not to be confused with “idealism.” Not everything needs to be productive. Life happens in the idle margins, margins that are shrinking by the day.
Idleism
To feel creatively and intellectually alive, you have to stop mindlessly consuming the Internet and start mindfully curating it.
It’s ok to wait, and it’s definitely ok to de-wheel from the hamsterism of today’s productivity theatre. In fact, you might need to if you really want to dream up a monster story.
Kristin Posehn • Mary Shelley (and a bit of Steve Jobs)—On the Art of Creative Waiting
You are allowed time off the Internet.
Emma Gannon • How to be less online in 2025
"One must be sane to think clearly, but one can think deeply and be quite insane."
- Nikola Tesla
- Nikola Tesla
Trudeau Resignation, Live TV Merger, and Reminiscing Y2K
Definition of FOOTLE
merriam-webster.com
There is a baffling amount of words, most of them negative, around the idea of “not doing much at all.” Wasting time, goofing off, slacking, foolishness
I think that “doing nothing”—in the sense of refusing productivity and stopping to listen—entails an active process of listening that seeks out the effects of racial, environmental, and economic injustice and brings about real change.
Jenny Odell • How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy
Aggressively uncreative practices such as aimless wandering or birdwatching (or, as she perceptively calls it, “bird listening”) offer “an antidote to the rhetoric of growth” that surrounds us every day. There is ultimately a feminist and environmental case to be made for doing nothing: if we can shift our notion of constructive social behavior fro
... See moreSamuel W. Franklin • The Cult of Creativity: A Surprisingly Recent History
Does the act of sitting in a park, patiently looking through a pair of binoculars and reading through field guides really deserve to be described with the same adjective usually reserved for angsty hardcore punk music, crusty anarchos and angry outcasts with ripped leather jackets?
If one considers punk as anything defiantly anti-capitalist, anti-es... See more
If one considers punk as anything defiantly anti-capitalist, anti-es... See more
Alexi Gunner • idle gaze 067: slowpunk
“Slowpunk”
Even if you don’t plan a whole trip around them, libraries are excellent spots for weary travelers: free, quiet, cool, full of locals, and staffed by people whose job is to help any visitors who walk in the door.
Austin Kleon • Library Tourism - Austin Kleon
Once we were camping outside of Savannah, GA, in the middle of December. The weather was mild, but gloomy. We spent the better part of a day in the downtown library - wifi, quiet, just getting out of the campsite for a bit. Free, which was nice. A good break from our usual bar-hopping tourism.