“Can You Squeeze Some Time?”: Living in a Fast-Paced World
Why is time squeezed?
The wording of squeezing time seems rather absurd. Why are we squeezing time? Squeezing represents this idea of being compressed and pushed beyond its limits. Imagine you are squeezing a lemon; you squeeze it till the last drop is out, leaving behind a very damaged lemon peel. Ultimately, the peel is discarded. The same happens to humans when we ‘squeeze time’. We end up trying to fit in too many tasks, which leaves behind a burned-out individual, just like the lemon peel. After our “juice” has been extracted, we are left exhausted, with the pressure to achieve more and more, but we don’t have any drive left in us. Society glorifies collecting every drop, valuing efficiency over well-being. But at what point do we stop squeezing?
Time with the help of the digital world
You might argue that technology is a tool used to maximize efficiency without spending as much time. This is undeniable. Many AI tools help us generate ideas, and online tools help us reach information in seconds. This makes completing work or school-related tasks time-effective. However, the implications of constant connectivity are overlooked. It leads to our work or school tasks following us like a tail. You could get a grade released or a work-related message from your boss at 9 pm. It is as if your brain cannot physically leave work behind. This makes it difficult to recharge after a hard day, and the cycle continues – time keeps getting squeezed…
The Productivity Trap
On top of being time-efficient, there is this relentless push to optimize every aspect of our lives for career development. Books should be self-improving, and hobbies should be monetized. Even in leisure, there is this need to keep improving and creating benefits. For example, people who enjoy painting might feel the pressure to sell their art online instead of painting just for pleasure. The vast opportunities the modern world provides to improve yourself mixed with the limited job opportunities; the job search has become more competitive than ever. The pressure to fit in as many activities or opportunities to improve yourself creates the feeling of never being enough, and time squeezes again…
The Cycle of Burnout
When the pursuit of productivity exceeds hours we have in a day, it can lead to burnout. Burnout is a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed (World Health Organization: WHO, 2019). It is a state in which the individual feels physically and emotionally drained. In a world where productivity is valued, people are pushed to their limits. Their energy gets squeezed out under the weight of productivity. The irony lies in the cycle where the person is burned out due to high expectations of productivity, and in return, the burned-out individual is not productive anymore.
Can we escape the squeeze?
The weekends might always seem short, but there might be ways to reduce this. It is important to work on this, as 83% of marketing and communications professionals are reporting burnout, which is also reciprocated in industries such as finance, sales, and HR (teamblind, 2020).
Planning is an important skill to gain to purpose your time efficiently. It is key to not underestimate the amount of time you need to complete a task by relying on optimistic scenarios. This is even defined in the APA (American Psychology Association) dictionary as the “Planning Fallacy” (APA Dictionary of Psychology, n.d.). This leads to an imbalance in life and the urge to complete more in a day than you physically can. The high expectations one has for oneself can lead to disappointment when not achieved. Therefore, it is important to plan accordingly to determine how much you can achieve (Eyal, 2022).
To not fall into the planning fallacy, one trick is to make to-do lists with a timebox. Timeboxing is a time management technique in which you reserve a time slot for each task. You can time yourself doing a certain task to properly estimate how long it takes to complete that task (Sherwin, 2023)
In the end, everything comes to the same point: time is being squeezed, but it is in your hands to manage your time accordingly by planning your day and enjoying your leisure time 😀
References:
Fishburne, Tom. (2020, September 6). the productivity trap –https://marketoonist.com/2020/09/the-productivity-trap.html
teamblind.com. (2020). THE EVOLUTION OF THE BURNOUT. In teamblind.com. https://www.teamblind.com/blog/content/files/StateofBurnoutCovid19.pdf
Sherwin, D. (2023, May 19). How to do timeboxing right – David Sherwin – medium. Medium. https://medium.com/@davidsherwin/how-to-do-timeboxing-a93ef076a9c3
APA Dictionary of Psychology. (n.d.). https://dictionary.apa.org/planning-fallacy
Eyal, N. (2022, December 13). 4 Mental traps that kill productivity. Nir And Far. https://www.nirandfar.com/productivity-mindset/
World Health Organization: WHO. (2019, May 28). Burn-out an “occupational phenomenon”: International Classification of Diseases. World Health Organization: WHO. https://www.who.int/news/item/28-05-2019-burn-out-an-occupational-phenomenon-international-classification-of-diseases
Vendi Havlucu Levi is a BSc Communication Science at the University of Amsterdam. She is interested in entertainment communication and the changing human relationships with the evolving digital world. In the future, she hopes to pursue a Masters degree within this field. In her free time, she enjoys watching reality tv shows and dancing. At Inter Vendi acts as a writing editor and helps managing media and outreach.
Madelene Nitzsche is a Cultural and Social Anthropology student at the University of Amsterdam with a background in communication studies, interior design, graphic design, and photography. Her experience growing up in Western and non-Western environments has influenced her interest in culture, art, urbanisation, and psychology. Opposing viewpoints, emotion, and contrast are a focus in her artistic work and it is also what drives her interest in the ethnographic approach. She is currently experimenting with multimedia artwork and poetry and perception of reality. Her vision is to integrate art and culture with ecology and community to improve societal relations and the relation to the self. You can follow her process @24yutori.