The Productivity Disease
In America ‘productivity’ is like a disease. We have been conditioned to believe that we have no value as a human being unless we are constantly ‘producing.’ The more we produce each day, the greater our value and self-worth. The less we produce each day, the less valuable and worthless we are.
Tony, you talk about fooling the body into thinking it’s ‘go-time’ instead of ‘slow-time.’ Instead of trying to fool the body how about actually LISTENING TO THE BODY? When the body starts feeling a bit sluggish it is telling us that it needs to rest and regenerate. There is no better way to rejuvenate our body’s energies than a short 30-minute afternoon nap. The body knows what it needs but in America we have been taught to never listen to our bodies and listen only to our over-active brains which are yelling, Produce! Produce! Produce! If we were to take a 30-minute afternoon nap then that is 30 minutes of lost productivity and that is anathema to America’s maniacal obsession with productivity.
Other countries are not so compulsively obsessed as Americans. Many people in many countries know the value of siesta time and structure their work days accordingly. They actually listen to their bodies instead of trying to fool them. They know that a quick siesta can actually enhance productivity better than trying to fool the body does.
And you know what happens when we continually try to fool our bodies? Our bodies eventually revolt and produce conditions of illness that forces us to finally listen to and pay attention to our bodies.
For most people it is perfectly natural to rest and rejuvenate with a nap in the afternoon. By doing so, we are following the natural energy cycles of our bodies. But we have been conditioned since childhood to always avoid anything that is natural. We have been taught to never listen to our bodies and instead treat them like beasts of burden that we must constantly fool with all manner of ‘hacks’ into forever producing more, more, more. It is no wonder that the average life expectancy in America is currently in decline.
We have become so maniacal about productivity that we have lost touch with our bodies and with what is natural and with the many joys in life that have nothing to do with productivity. We are getting to the point where death is the only way we’ll ever get to rest.
