Leisure Nation

There is a working class - strong and happy - among both rich and poor: there is an idle class - weak, wicked, and miserable - among both rich and poor.
JOHN RUSKIN

Ahhhh, the good life. Sandy beaches. Sun. Clear blue water. Ocean waves. An icy Corona in one hand. It is what we all aspire to have. No job and money to blow. A life of endless leisure. But what if this life was just a bunch of shit? What if this life of leisure was just one big fat lie? Guess what. It is.

In The Hatred of Work, I discussed how work was vital to happiness, and the reason people hated work was because they were obligated to do it. The alternative life to this workaholic Puritan lifestyle is a life of leisure. This is the life of hedonism. The problem is that hedonism does not bring happiness.

There are two types of hedonism. The first type of hedonism is crass hedonism. This was the philosophy of the ancient Cyrenaics that held that pleasure was the highest good. In short, the Cyrenaics were out to have a good time, and they did. Their philosophy was to eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow they would be dead. There is only pleasure and pain.

To understand the Cyrenaic philosophy, you should go out and get drunk, use drugs, have unprotected sex, etc. Now, a critic will respond by saying that all this hedonistic behavior results in negative consequences such as hangovers, overdoses, and sexually transmitted diseases. The Cyrenaic response was that these things would happen but they would happen to someone else--your future self. Since nothing exists but the present, you should party hard and ignore the consequences. If this sounds like madness, this is precisely the logic of party people today. Tomorrow never comes. There is only today. This might seem stupid, but we acknowledge the wisdom when we say carpe diem or "seize the day."

The Cyrenaic school died out to be replaced by the more sophisticated Epicurean school. This is the second type of hedonism which is refined hedonism. Epicurus agreed that pleasure was the highest good, but he defined that pleasure as the absence of pain. It is senseless to drink excessively because it produces more pain. The answer is to abstain and drink water. Live a simple and care free life. Where the Cyrenaics would be represented today by fraternity brothers, Epicureans are best represented by people who live the simple life. The problem with this refined hedonism is what psychologists call the "hedonic treadmill."

With the hedonic treadmill, people rapidly adjust to their current situation whether good or bad. Pleasure and pain are indifferent over the longer term because we get used to it. People have a set point for happiness. This is why if you acquire a certain number of material possessions or discard them it ends up all being the same. From this we see that happiness is not pleasure. Hedonism is a lie. That idyllic life on that sandy beach is merely boredom in about a day or so. More than likely, you will retire to your swank hotel room to watch TV which is exactly what you can do at home.

Vacations, trips, and all the rest are nothing more than vain attempts to convince others that we are happy and living the good life. This is what we see in the commercials, so we try and emulate what the marketing tells us. But I have been on those sandy beaches. I have done those fun things, and they suck.

I am a eudaimonist thinker when it comes to happiness. I tend to agree with Aristotle that happiness is "flourishing" or a life of activity lived according to reason. It is a hard concept to grasp since there is no exact equivalent in English. But this is the reason people go to the gym and work out. This is the reason people sit down and learn a foreign language or play chess. This is the reason I like working so much.

The pleasure that comes from these rational activities is known as "flow." You can't find this pleasure by aiming directly at it. It is the byproduct of doing an activity. It is akin to hedonism. Unlike hedonism, there is no hedonic treadmill. It is a constant striving, working, and seeking. This flow feeds on itself and finds other activities. The result is a robustness in living and a bursting of real joy in your being. The reason few people find this flow is because it is wrapped inside the plain brown wrapper of work.

The Puritans hewed towards this eudaimonistic understanding of happiness. They dressed up in religious garb, but it is fundamentally no different than what Aristotle was getting at. Utilitarianism is the child of the hedonists. This is why Ayn Rand disparaged libertarians as a bunch of pot smokers. Her philosophy was more in keeping with that eudaimonistic school. As such, I tend to agree with her. Everything else is just cows eating grass.

The conventional wisdom today is that work is bad while leisure is good. We endure work for the purpose of having leisure which is the real goal. I disagree with this mindset. I believe that leisure is had for the sake of doing work. We eat, sleep, exercise, read, and study for the sake of those rational activities we call work. Leisure is a form of rest. The work is what matters.

You can see this with the people that end up in leisure. What do they do? They express boredom. Sitting on the beach sucks, so they go in for a swim. They buy a surfboard and learn how to surf. They read a book. They all end up doing something. Doing nothing just sucks. This is why I end up hating all vacations, day trips, and the like. It is so goddamn boring.

To be happy means a constant life of work, yet this idea is constantly attacked. If you work too much, you are called a "workaholic." Like the alcoholic or the cocaine addict, it is always the family that bears the trauma of the workaholic's "addiction." Nevermind that they don't mind spending the workaholic's money. And what do the families all want? Vacations. Lots and lots of vacations. When the workaholic buckles under and satisfies his hedonistic family, the excuse is always the same. He needs to avoid "burnout." He needs to spend more time with the family. Blah blah fucking blah.

Consider these two vacation ideas. In the first plan, you decide to go to Key West and fish off some pier, drink beer, and listen to Jimmy Buffett. In the second plan, you go to climb a mountain in Pakistan. Which sounds more appealing to you? Imagine telling your family that on the next vacation you are going on a 250-mile hike. Suddenly, they find your workaholism is quite tolerable.

This is why I find this whole family living thing so irritating. It is simply a cover for hedonism and idleness. You can't tell people that you are going to goof off. So, it becomes "quality time with the family." But quality time with the family is doing stuff like helping kids with the homework or pitching in on the weekends on a Habitat for Humanity project. These people aren't fooling me. Family time is watching TV while drinking some beers while the kids beat the shit out of each other. At the right level of buzz, they fade out completely.

People spend time with their families because they love them, and there is nothing wrong with this. I encourage this. The problem is that almost any activity qualifies as family time. When I was growing up, I spent a lot of time with my dad. This was because he owned his own business, and I ended up working. Ironically, I enjoyed the work more than the unpleasant vacations we took together. I dreaded those trips.

The most valuable lessons I learned from my old man were work lessons. I learned how to drive big trucks. I learned how to endure unpleasant conditions. I learned the camaraderie that comes when people work together. The bulk of the stories I tell about my old man are work related. I also appreciated what he did for me because I saw the work he did. I saw him work injured and sick because he had to do it. It left a lasting impression on me. I don't give a shit now that we went to Disney World one year.

This Leisure Cult we have here in America has it wrong. They have it backwards. Work is what brings happiness not sipping margaritas on a beach. The most valuable time you can spend with your family is working on a project together or learning a skill or getting in shape. And if all this sounds exhausting, go take a nap. You need some rest. The problem isn't needing to rest. The problem is being idle and convincing yourself that this idleness constitutes the good life. Here's your wake up call. It isn't the good life. It is cows eating grass. Don't waste your precious life on this bogus bullshit.

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NOTES

1. Cyrenaics

2. Hedonic treadmill

3. Paradox of hedonism

4. Eudaimonism

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