Member-only story
A Leisurely Revolution
The Drama Between Freedom & Compulsion
I recently went an entire day alone in my apartment, from waking to sleeping. No work, no obligations, a full fridge, and a functioning toilet. Time was emptied of all unnecessary compulsions, an absence of which I thought meant freedom.
This was, in some sense, a dream realized, if only for a day. 24-hours entirely my own, supplied with all necessary means to remain alive & comfortable. A kind of microcosm of utopia where all my basic needs are covered without spending most of the day working to secure them, leaving me to tango with time as I choose.
This dance between freedom & compulsion is what I intend to explore, using my day of leisure as a microscope. Anaïs Nin calls this the hero of her diary, the modern malady where our lives are dramas of compulsion rather than freedom:
“The hero of this book is the malady which makes our lives a drama of compulsion instead of freedom.”
This malady lurks within industrial society and 40-hour workweeks everywhere. In an age of unprecedented wealth, technology, and objective well-being, compulsion remains the magnetic center of too many lives; our freedoms remain skin deep.
Like a virus, the malady of compulsion spreads an institutionalized mentality incapable of leisure…
