Leisure, Screens, Work: Finding a Balance in Our Lives

Leisure, Screens, Work: Finding a Balance in Our Lives
Recreation offers an escape from work and in a sense, from ourselves. Vidar Nordli-Mathisen/Unsplash
Jeff Minick
Updated:

A friend—I’ll call her Maggie—and I were recently talking by phone when the subject of leisure arose, along with questions such as: Once we’ve finished our work, which often seems unending, what do we do? And is there a difference between recreation and leisure? Spending an evening on social media, watching a televised football game, walking at sunset on a beach, carving out wooden toys for grandchildren: all offer a break from work, but are the benefits equivalent?

For Maggie, a wife, mother, and busy professional, cooking and baking provide a respite from the workplace. Her kitchen creations take her away from her computer screen and telephone, and bring her the satisfaction of creating tasty dishes with her own hands.

Jeff Minick
Jeff Minick
Author
Jeff Minick has four children and a growing platoon of grandchildren. For 20 years, he taught history, literature, and Latin to seminars of homeschooling students in Asheville, N.C. He is the author of two novels, “Amanda Bell” and “Dust on Their Wings,” and two works of nonfiction, “Learning as I Go” and “Movies Make the Man.” Today, he lives and writes in Front Royal, Va.
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