The most pathetic sentence of the 21st Century

How many times a day do we hear this sentence "I don't have time"? Arnold Bennet, author of the celebrated novel "The Old Wives Tale", also wrote a small book "How to live on 24 hours a day" more than a century ago. 

He said that "Essentially, you do have time; you just don't realise it. We never shall have any more time. We have, & we have always had, all the time there is". He proceeds to analyse what the average man does after  work, & proves he wastes at least 6 hours before going to bed. He also adds that one can get up at least an hour earlier in the morning.

For Homi Bhabha, the nuclear physicist, the arts were not just relaxation, but as essential in life as physics & mathematics. He felt art was what made life worth living. He was an avid painter & connoisseur of Western classical music. Raja Ramanna, also a nuclear physicist, was an accomplished pianist. Sudha Murty, the busy philanthropist, just gets up an hour earlier in the morning, to indulge in creative writing. What is badly needed is not extra time but focus & mental discipline to make the best of the time available.

In more recent times, Katherine Rundell, author of the award winning "Rooftoppers", became a Fellow of the All Souls College at 21 & later produced a doctoral dissertation on John Donne. She also learnt to walk a tightrope forwards, backwards & in high heels!

Allan Rusbridger, who was Editor of "Guardian" during the Wikileaks period & was working a stressful 14-16 hours a day, also managed to squeeze in piano playing & managed to learn the fearsomely difficult Chopin Ballade No. 1.

Such being the case, the commonly used words "passing the time" & worse "killing time" assume a sinister meaning. These ways of spending time are nothing less than  criminal.

The same people who claim to have no time, will find time fast enough if there is money to be made or status to be attained! And all this to gain what Luke 16:15 says  "What is esteemed among men, is an abomination in the sight of God." The same thing was said by St.Teresa of Avila in other words. "More tears are shed over answered prayers than over unanswered ones." Because in our ignorance, we always pray for things which are harmful to us in the long run. Even in Hinduism & Islam, the only efficacious prayer is submission to God's Will.

So to conclude, the best human activity is contemplation of God, followed closely by cultural activities, to indulge in which "when there is a will, there is a way."