We live in an age of hyper-awareness, where we know what’s happening everywhere, to everyone. When we acknowledge that the common trope of enhancing perfectionism within, is problematic and how this only further burdens the individual with something unattainable to strive for and that burns out the person. While we still romanticise the trope of normalising the need to be productive, taking efficiency on a whole other level, where people want to get better than their previous version for the sake of justifying growth and yes, it’s not necessarily bad to be productive and want to excel, but it only enrolls us into the larger narrative of being successful and deserving that success means, much of yourself to be invested into the latest measure of success and the simpleton idea of thriving right now is to constantly compete with your peers, trying to know where your standing is in this structure that we have built cased our lives in right?
When I sit down and mute the clock within me, for a while I get to see productivity for what it really is, flattened and linear. I just push myself for a constant day, hour or minute, maybe I can shove in another task, chore or duty within my schedule so that my time isn’t wasted and I make the best out of everything. Was it always like this? When did I start to think that whatever I did wasn’t enough or whoever I used to be wasn’t enough, and when did it become a pressure for me to constantly try to evolve? When did my privilege turn into my guilt of not being miserable enough or to not have struggled enough to gain the success I think I used to deserve? When did I start thinking that my life became a race and I was left behind, by everyone else, in my own life, in my own race?
What I was told in the beginning was that being productive and being constructive is about the emphasis on working to the best of your abilities, maximising and channelizing every hour of the day, get ahead of your schedule to get ahead of the next day itself. Being in college is something that has made my fear of being left behind more sound and real. When I see my peers being engaged in so many societies, working on internships, bringing in their effort for department fests and proving out to be more of merit and usage than me, it makes me quiver with the anxiety of me not doing enough. Getting a degree alone is not enough, everyone starts working on their CV and their certificates and prices start piling up when I don’t even know where should I start? While seeing others excel was something which should have made me feel inspired and motivated enough to catch up, it doesn’t feel that good or optimistic really. I find it really easy and convenient to bog down myself when I compare myself to my peers and friends. Again to emphasise, this is not a bad thing to be good at almost everything, it’s great, but the truth is also that we cannot embody all those desirable qualities that we overestimate ourselves to achieve sometimes. It’s one thing to motivate yourself to achieve something and another, to push yourself to an extent that you sometimes burn out. As we all reside in time with so much compressed energy to excel and survive, we feel like we must get better than others, to feel safe and secure in our place in life, but in the end, do we really feel satisfied? I don’t know about it anymore, the perceived fear of being left behind is something that scares me to my core sometimes, so I try to take an extra-long leap to keep up with others.
The thing about productivity is that the effect itself is twofold; first, in our life the ever-increasing pace of leaving a mark has become a sort of obligation, to get done with things in a shorter amount of time to make space for the next task. Secondly, the nexus on which we compare our growth also grows exponentially and it doesn’t come to an end, leaving us longing for more eventually. With the consequences always flashing in front of us, that if we don’t get better at improving and evolving, then someone else is going to bag our chances of getting better. Being open to opportunities and collecting them are different concepts to us. Being constantly engaged with work and chores is an unrealistic and potentially harmful goal that we set for ourselves with being or trying to be constantly productive is also something that could lead to similar effects. Mental exhaustion and physical burnout are visible to make it clear for us to understand our limits and not to push ourselves.
I often end up feeling dissatisfied with my productivity and so I make up my mind to cut myself some slack from time to time, I really want to sometimes sit down and stare at the ceiling and do nothing for a while. With the current status quo of the world being in lockdown I don’t want to make the best out of everything, I just don’t want to flow away without the suggestions of everyone telling how to use my time more efficiently, when in entirety productivity is just making the usage of time valuable. I really don’t want myself wishing to exceed that limit every time. I want to take a break from running and maybe this is the best time to heal and take a breath from trying to be so productive during the quarantine.