Marking Time…

There are many times when we feel we are marking time – or worse – wasting time. There are times when we wait for people and appointments and feel cheated as we think of what we might have done with the time we waste in waiting. There are times when we are traveling between places, when the time it takes may seem more or less lost. There are times when we are pressed into pursuits not of our own choosing – on detours from our intended destination – as, for example, time spent in making a living at uninteresting work while waiting for other work, or while preparing for other occupations; or time spent by young men in military service when they are eager to settle down to other purposes. But in these unavoidable interruptions, there is often much more that can be done than is sometimes supposed. Wherever a man is, he has his mind with him. Wherever he is, he can think and plan and pursue, mentally at least, constructive purposes. Almost wherever he is he can arrange to read – not trash or trivia, but from the best books. It isn’t always so, but it can often be so. Almost wherever a man is, he can write. It takes only simple tools to write – and some significant writings have come even from men who were confined. Many interesting and profitable activities have been pursued by shut-ins, by those who couldn’t go out from where they were, with some wonderfully useful results. A man can be immobilized without immobilizing his mind. Some of the most successful people have learned what to do with the idle and in-between times that so many of us waste – sometimes just sitting, sometimes just waiting, sometimes with impatient pacing. Almost wherever a person is, he can find some constructive purpose to pursue, without wasting time in trivial or tawdry pursuits. In a sense we can’t “save” time as we can save water in a reservoir – but we can put time into preparation – to be used later, rather than let it run away.