I still remember the days when we used to have Nintendo game consoles with these falsely marketed ‘1000 in one’ game cards. To be fair it had around 100 games in it including the classic Mario bros, Contra, Minesweeper and few others that we constantly played. Me and my friends used to have our rounds playing the games for a couple of hours before we were thrown out of the house to play outside (Let that nostalgia kick in!)
Options to do things were very limited back then. We only had a few hours to play each day, only a few places we get to visit, limited amount of time in recess to hang out with friends. I thoroughly remember we used to get 15 mins of recess (I know right? what’s wrong with the authority?) and we used to eat our lunch like dogs on steroid so it finishes within 5 mins. We only did this so we get at least 10 mins to go outside and play. That 10 min break was the best part during school, off course after the final bell.
Because we had limited options, we really looked forward to doing things that made us happy, and those things actually did. Whatever we had was good enough for us to have fun and be exited about. Off-course we desired more and wanted more things in life (because we’re humans) but we never gave up good night sleep thinking about it. All we could think about was the time we’ll get to play with friends tomorrow, this type I’ll beat all of them and be the hero.
Things changed big time when we grew up. Thousands of clothes to choose from hundreds of e-commerce stores, Countless games in the steam library where you purchased games but never played (I feel you!), Thousands of channels to choose from to watch while you eat and guess what? you could never decide what to watch, infinite videos on YouTube flooding you with suggestions and keeping you engaged to keep watching without getting any shit done.
What hasn’t change though is time. Because time is still limited with those 24 hours in a classic day, we’re bound to do more in less time.
I love this quote from Avengers: Endgame by Tony Stark “No amount of money ever bought a second of time” and that went deep.
We started chasing dead lines, figuring out plans to do for the weekend (only if you feel like it), Choose between so many friends to hang out with. We got immensely overwhelmed with work and options in daily life.
What I learned was when we have fewer options, we feel more important and and less confused, but the more options we have the more stressed and confused we are. Think about choosing something to eat from a menu that has only 4 food items and from a menu which has 40 food items. Yes, calculate the decision making time in your head.
Try to decrease the options in your life. The less shit you have to deal with, the happier you get.
Artwork: https://dribbble.com/shots/4159109-Late-studying
Leave a Reply