January 15, 2006
ACTIVE LAZINESS
How many of us are swept away by what I have come to call an �active laziness�? Naturally there are different species of laziness: Eastern and Western. The Eastern style consists of hanging out all day in the sun, doing nothing, avoiding any kind of work or useful activity, drinking cups of tea and gossiping with friends.
Western laziness is quite different. It consists of cramming our lives with compulsive activity, so that there is no time left to confront the real issues.
If we look into our lives, we will see clearly how many unimportant tasks, so-called �responsibilities� accumulate to fill them up. One master compares them to �housekeeping in a dream.� We tell ourselves we want to spend time on the important things of life, but there never is any time.
Helpless, we watch our days fill up with telephone calls and petty projects, with so many responsibilities�or should we call them �irresponsibilities�?
- Sogyal Rinpoche