The Time That is Given Us: Productivity and Leisure in the Modern Age

“I now see that I spent most of my life in doing neither what I ought nor what I liked”.

C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

Risking Enchantment is back for 2022, and in our first episode back Rachel is joined by Phoebe, to discuss our resolutions for how we hope to spend our time in the coming year. Using the above quote as inspiration, we discuss how to balance productivity with leisure, how schedules enable us to achieve our goals but can also lead us into the tyranny of efficiency, and how leisure is part of God’s plan for us but in our modern age true leisure is hard to achieve. We look to literary references to help us understand how best to spend our time, whether it’s the story of nuns and the tolling bell of their schedule in Rumer Godden’s book In This House of Brede, or Fran Lebowitz’s life of idleness as listed her humorous book Metropolitan Life.

 

Music: Ashton Manor by Kevin MacLeod

Hosts: Rachel Sherlock, Phoebe Watson

Follow me on social media: @seekingwatson

Follow the podcast on Instagram: @riskingenchantmentpodcast

Find out more at www.rachelsherlock.com

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Works Mentioned in this Episode:

The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis

“The Lost Art of Intentionality” - Word on Fire

From The Writing Life by Annie Dillard

Idle Moments: Literary Loafers through the Ages and Pages - The Slightly Foxed Podcast

The Fran Lebowitz Reader by Fran Lebowitz

Heretics by G.K. Chesterton

The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien

In This House of Brede by Rumer Godden

The Power of Silence: Against the Dictatorship of Noise by Cardinal Robert Sarah

Wonder in a Digital Age - Born of Wonder podcast

“Burnt Norton” by T.S. Eliot

“The Three Sicknesses of U.S. Society: Racism, Poverty, and War” by Martin Luther King Jr 

 

What We're Enjoying at the Moment:

Phoebe: The Lord of the Rings, audiobook read by Rob Inglis

Rachel: That Hideous Strength by C.S. Lewis