The Death of Leisure
What is leisure? Why is it important? And is the rise of acedia starving our souls?
In leisure we reveal what kind of people we are.
— Ovid
I’ve been reading a number of books, including Josef Pieper’s Leisure: The Basis of Culture as my 8-year-old daughter swims after little schools of fish she finds at the lake. She is my youngest child. My two older sons are in a special summer program but my two other daughters are at home, having argued to stay back with their dad who is working. I told them to stay off of screens—reminding them that they could draw or sew or read books. For some reason, this was a hard sell.
I am convinced that the problem is online media. We call it “streaming” and it really is like a having a house full of faucets that are constantly on. You go around turning off all the handles only to discover that someone has turned one back on in another room. Despite all methods of trying to control the water supply someone finds a workaround, installs their own faucet somewhere. It is a tiring game.
But it is not a game. A game would be fun—an act of leisure. What is going on is acedia—a lack of care for the world and a lack of connection with others.
Leisure in Greek is skole and in Latin it is scola which turns into the English word for school. If you think about it, elementary and secondary school is not where we learn to work but where we learn to conceive, create, and contemplate. We learn numbers and grammar. We craft language and art. We are taught how to be good citizens (supposedly). We swim in the waters of many subjects. We learn how to dive deeper into the areas we enjoy. We acquire knowledge—and hopefully—a love of learning.
Outside of school leisure allows the soul to contemplate the joy of movement, like swimming in a lake or playing tennis with friends or walking alone in the woods. Sometimes we choose to make something, like a mitten, birdhouse, or a painted portrait of one’s dog. One of the characteristics of leisure is that the act is not a means to an end. The means of leisure is the end.
“Culture depends for its very existence on leisure, and leisure, in its turn, is not possible unless it has a durable and consequently living link with the cultus, with divine worship.”
— Josef Pieper, Leisure: The Basis of Culture
The word culture is derived from the Latin cultus which means “fulfilling the ritual of public sacrifice.” The roots of culture are religious. They are spiritual and supernatural. When we think of culture we think of music, the visual arts, architecture, literature, language, and theater. Indeed, these things, when done with great skill, can be so beautiful as to call the soul outside of one’s self. Art, as a form of leisure, has a transcendent quality that is done for its own good. Art—in essence—is not made for utility or productivity. Its creation is its own virtue.
However, modern western culture has suffered from the development of two cults:
productivity, and
commoditized mass entertainment.
I know people who, after washing down their avocado toast with their 8 ounces of celery juice, listen to self-help podcasts at 3x speed while doing their TikTok #6packabsworkout. Is this #WINNING? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Then you have the cults of personality—heroic and idealized leaders whose fame impersonalizes them, strips them of actual humanity, and turns them into idols. Music fans have re-christened themselves after their Chosen Ones: Swifties, Bieliebers, Bey Hivers, and BTS ARMY, which stands for BTS Adorable Representative M.C. for Youth.
Influencers abound on all forms for social media, feeding off the insecurities of the followers (again the language of worship). We call this aspirational, not inspirational. There is no Holy Spirit that guides this way of life. No, this is the Dao of Desire.
One could define culture as the collective manifestation of the intellectual, artistic, and philosophical achievements of a society, nation or people. If this is the case, what exactly have we achieved as a society? By the definition of cultus, to what deity have we sacrificed our time, money, and toil? Is this the new Temple of Aphrodite—where one worships everlasting youth, power, attractiveness, and wealth?
I suspect part of the problem is the disintegration our educational institutions. In an age where music is being cut from elementary school budgets and liberal arts majors are eliminated from our places of higher education, you are seeing the eradication of the very things that make a society cultured, beautiful, and philosophical. Culture needs leisure, and being at leisure is a skillful act. People must learn how to read a novel deeply in order to unlock the deeper meanings of a story. It makes us more sympathetic and empathetic. There is a beauty to knowing how to look at art, how to use a hammer, how to read music, or how to throw a perfect spiral. Not everyone needs to know all of these things, but everyone should have the opportunity to discover an art or craft that they love so they can feel the joy of moving, of making, of passing it on to others. Leisure is a generative act. It is also a divine act.
I have a bachelor’s in literature, and I have had a successful career in office management, recruiting, and human resources. My literature degree made me a better communicator and more understanding person by connecting and understanding through the power of storytelling. Learning how to access the arts through leisure made me a better member of society—though at no to low economic gain to my personal welfare.
Work done for a profitable end is an act of acquisition. A break in work is not leisure if it is done so that one can return to work. Leisure is a mental and spiritual attitude of receiving a gift or grace, not a method for returning to a day of toil. Leisure is much like sleep, in that you need it in order to feel restored.
Does binge watching a series all night leave you drained instead of replenished?
Don’t be fooled. Mindless entertainment is not leisure.
The last time we were at the lake I was watching my daughter in her blue suit learn to swim for longer and longer underwater. She had discovered where the fish like to hide. She emerged out of the water smiling her smile with missing teeth,
“I touched a fish!” First contact.
And that day she stayed till the lake closed down for the day, chasing the wonder that lives below the surface. She’ll know summers now by the feeling of finding and swimming with creatures she won’t see for the rest of the year. Every day this summer she has wanted to go back. And I have a feeling that with every passing year, even decades later, she will want to chase that memory of touching a fish for the first time. Leisure is not just about contemplation. It is about communion with something barely touchable, unknowable—yet felt down to the very soul.
Elizabeth Bishop wrote about a fish with “a five-haired beard of wisdom trailing from his aching jaw.” My fish is a memory. It’s a poem. It’s the daughter who’s here. It’s the children who aren’t. The fish is the art of making. It’s the gift of receiving. I open up my arms to receive the big catch. I see the rainbow, and just as Bishop writes, I let it go.
Leisure isn’t about the taking, the full net of profit. It’s about the fishing—not the fish.
Leisure is mothering in summertime, watching from the sand as my daughter turns into mermaid for a few seconds in the bewitching light.
And leisure is doing nothing but receiving the grace offered in the moment.
I enjoyed some of these moments in Montana this summer, fishing while my kids played in the shallows, spreading mud on their arms and cheeks like they were at a spa. Such a nice respite. Thanks for sharing this, and happy birthday!
A lyrical essay on beauty, life, discovery and "The Fish" by Elizabeth Bishop towards a beautiful close like the turn of a poem.