Now, I'm not saying watching all of these is necessarily a bad thing. Liz and I have enjoyed all of these series, and many of them have been intellectually stimulating. However, it does strike me exactly how much TV this is when I list it all out. Further, we have a tendency to go through these series very quickly. Usually, once we get into a series, all we want to do during an evening is sit back, pop in the next episode and relax. Interestingly, though, we find that the longer a series goes on, the less actual relaxing we're doing. In fact, there is normally a point in a series where we look forward to getting it over with simply so we aren't watching TV any more!
It's this phenomenon, this "TV exhaustion," that really strikes me as interesting. Growing up, we always had a TV in the household, and as a kid growing up in the 90's I was pretty much always glued to it. It wasn't until I got to Christendom that I stopped watching TV for hours every day. Life became just too busy, and since TVs weren't allowed in the dorms, I wasn't going to go out of my way to watch it. Instead, I spent my time studying, reading, hanging out with friends, praying in the chapel (less than I ought to have), and taking part in various campus events. During this time, I began to see what a life without TV was like. I learned how to truly relax, and how to enjoy life outside the screen.
A couple of nights ago, instead of watching TV, I read aloud to Liz some of the stories of James Herriot. If you haven't read them, I would definitely say you have to check them out. They are a set of stories about a veterinarian in the English country side. They are stories of dogs, pigs, cows, sheep, cats, farms, gardens, men, women and creation. Sitting there, reading aloud to my wife and son, I became more relaxed than I had been in a long time. I wasn't completely inactive like when I was watching TV, but that's what made it so relaxing.
Josef Pieper used to talk about how true leisure involves action, while the modern world tries to sell inaction as leisure. Good, wholesome activities such as reading books, playing music, and going for walks constitute true leisure. The difficulty is that we have become accustomed, as a culture, to complete inactivity. In some sense, inactivity is easier than active leisure, but it's not nearly as restful. At the end of a long work day, I don't really feel like practicing the banjo or reading out loud - that is, until I do it anyways. Then, I find that I am more refreshed then when I am simply inactive in front of the TV.
Don't get me wrong - I don't know if there is necessarily anything wrong with relaxing by watching TV. I simply aim to propose an alternative. Rather than watching TV, I think more people should try to find activities to cultivate for leisure. If they did, I wonder if our society would start moving towards a more creative and intellectual society, rather than one that gets most of its views while "vegging" out.
I enjoyed this post on 'TV exhaustion,' Matt, and have to say, I've had similar thoughts on the matter. My time at Christendom, too, taught me that there could be great relaxation and leisure found in activities other than TV watching. (It is funny what you discover when you are taken outside of your comfort zone.) I find I am more satisfied now with reading, conversing, baking, playing or listening to music, etc. than just simply vegging out in front of the TV, something I did frequently in high school.
ReplyDeleteI think there IS something to Pieper's thesis about ACTIVE leisure, not that a wholesome film isn't good for you every once and a while. But it seems to me there is something more human about activities that allow us to interact with others, or even objects like musical instruments, than the passivity of television watching. We are creative in nature, and television eradicates that process almost entirely. (Except maybe in the critique.)