How economical are you with your time? ‘It feels a bit antisocial, not being busy’ | Work

As a Brabant entrepreneur’s daughter, a few convictions were instilled in me at a young age. You work as much as you can and idleness is the devil’s ear cushion. In other words: people who don’t know what to do will do nothing. Like an aunt gave me a high tone when I was in doubt as a student about what to do after my studies: ,,We had to work, work, work, that’s what we had to do!” At the same time, it is not the intention that you spend those hard-earned pennies. ,,Brown can’t take that,” my mother regularly sneered.

We are probably all infected with this ‘time is money’ principle. Remember that not working is loss, was the advice of American ‘founding father’ Benjamin Franklin as early as 1748 to young merchants. If you can earn ten shillings with a day’s work, but waste half a day, you lose 5 shillings. It was the dawn of the industrial revolution, a turning point in how we work. We no longer worked independently, but as wage labourers.

No wonder so many people raise an eyebrow when I tell them that me and my boyfriend both work 32 hours. ‘But you can just work 40 hours, can’t you?’ Correct. But we think free time is more important. Harvard Business School psychologist Ashley Whillans conducted a survey of some 100,000 people and found that people who choose more time and less money are, on average, happier, more satisfied with their work, less stressed and have better relationships. Not money, but time brings happiness.

You can spend money in all sorts of ways to get more time, says Whillans. Working less, having groceries delivered at home, but also, for example, stopping to take a detour for cheaper petrol or endlessly searching for bargains. Or pay someone to do tedious tasks for you, such as gardening, cleaning, ironing, and cooking. But I’m not a thief of my own wallet after all, we seem to think. But if we were to have a time wallet in addition to a money wallet, then we suddenly notice how criminally we deal with this preciousness.

It feels a bit antisocial, not being busy. My boyfriend doesn’t want a cleaner either. He feels guilty when someone else has to clean up our mess. Nonsense, says Whillans. You make time to be there for your family, friends, colleagues, society and the planet. Now to convince my aunt.

Would you like to know more about psychology and work? Read Chantal’s books Why perfectionists are rarely happy, 13 tips against perfectionism (2021) and Our fallible thinking at work (2018).

Watch all our work and career videos here: