Madame Figaro. - How to define otium?
Jean-Miguel Pire.-
Like intelligent leisure, this part of free time that we use to develop our consciousness, our knowledge, our lucidity, our imagination, our empathy... It is the life of the mind in the sense non-religious of the term, which allows us to progress and makes us more protagonist of our mental life. Otium, Latin translation of
skholê
, was born in 5th century Greece, with the advent of philosophy. Today, we use the word without knowing it when we talk about trading, which comes from
nec otium
, the “negation of otium”: it is about the market. Seeking otium therefore means fighting against market forces, which tend to dominate all spheres of our lives, from work to health and education. However, it is striking to note that philosophy, as a mode of rational thought, has imposed itself... but not the time necessary for reflection! This all works in a very paradoxical way.
Why, do you think?
Because we don't immediately see the usefulness of this time devoted to thinking. In ancient societies dominated by survival, devoting oneself to reflection, although highly valued, remains perceived as an aristocratic privilege inaccessible to the majority. We are always in this software, very ambivalent: everyone knows that we need time to think but, spontaneously, we tend to believe that we do not have time for that. Except at school. The otium thus focuses on an essential question for once again becoming the protagonist of one's own life: the time it takes, in a day, to reflect, and the way in which one can ritualize it.
Of course, free time and paid leave have increased, but the mental load invades all our space
There is no shortage of obstacles, starting with work...
On the scale of human history, it has been, for an immense majority of individuals, a source of radical alienation and crushing of available time, it is true. In the 20th century, social laws imposed dignity, control of conditions and maximum working hours, but also paid leave. A time dedicated to entertainment, rest but also to education, therefore to intelligent leisure. Workers took evening art history classes and then went to the museum, for example. This virtuous curve grew until the 1980s. Trading values then invaded the professional field. Speed, material utilitarianism, short-termism, the idea that work can no longer be fulfilling... Today, work is getting closer to what it was before the 1930s: a kind of survival. Of course, free time and paid leave have increased, but the mental load invades our entire space. So much so that we no longer have either the taste or the energy necessary for otium, which requires effort, a certain discipline, and above all availability. This is the danger of this evolution of work, formidable because it does not speak its name, which maintains the appearance of social rights but takes away their enjoyment.
On a daily basis, can we really reconcile work and free time?
Just after the Covid-19 pandemic, thanks to tension in the world of work, candidates found themselves in a position of strength to impose their conditions. Salaries, of course, but also linked to quality of life and free time. This period shows us how much, among all the levers that can make us protagonists of our own existence, representation matters. In my opinion, we neglect too much the importance of how we imagine our free time, and how we value it or not. Of course, some people don't have a minute to themselves. But never before have so many people had as much free time as they do today. Part of it could be available to gain intelligence and emancipate ourselves. However, he is monopolized by the mental load of work, but also, and above all, by his addiction to screens.
Also read: Gabriel Attal: “Regarding the use of screens at home, we are close to a health and educational disaster”
Is this where the real danger lies, in your opinion?
Yes, it is a predation, which plays on our inability to understand the mechanisms put in place to break down our barriers. Patrick Le Lay, former president of TF1, said it very well in the 1990s: “We sell available brain time”. Where cinema and television were fumbling, social networks and online platforms have shifted into high gear. Their economic model, to develop, needs to capture more and more of our brain time. Not to cultivate us, but to make us more passive and addicted to screens. All this, thanks to the help of laboratories responsible for maximizing addictive mechanisms, invading our consciousness with advertisements and, ultimately, transforming us into a pure object: a credit card.
Also read: Isabelle Diacono, founder of Jolies Planches: “A digital addiction? No, I’m even fed up!”
What do you suggest to resist it?
A step aside, in order to question what constitutes the heart of our life. “Everything else is borrowed, time is our only asset,” said Seneca. My idea, basically, is to imagine your life as a series of moments to ask yourself which of them are free from all constraints. When, in our day, are we not taken up by anything, neither work, nor vital tasks - eating, sleeping - nor family tasks? Some sociologists call this arbitral time, that for which we are not accountable to anyone. There is necessarily half an hour of our day, or half a day in our week, thus free from everything. I suggest identifying it and ritualizing it, with the same care we take to organize our time at work or with family. Let us impose on ourselves a certain discipline, chosen, the aim of which is to get better, to gain in lucidity, in discernment, in empathy, to move towards greater selflessness.
But concretely, what do we do with this half hour?
What the Ancients called spiritual exercises. You can take half an hour to go look at works at the museum, for example, or indulge in the “king exercise”, reading. Let's take the time to immerse ourselves in a book that we know will nourish us, allow us to answer certain questions. Let's perhaps do it with a pen in hand to take notes, copy certain passages... Even if we write a lot on our screens, handwriting allows us to reintroduce density into our relationship with time. Let's not judge this half hour of otium according to its speed, as we evaluate everything else, but according to the density, the intensity that it brings us. This intensity is a luxury within everyone’s reach.
What do we have to gain?
The quest for fertility rather than utility. This corresponds perfectly to commercial software, which aims for a precise objective, according to a monetary interest, therefore calculable. Fertility is not. She explores existences and unpredictable possibilities. When we engage in a fruitful process, such as reading, a long, deep conversation with someone, a walk in the museum, we do not know where it is leading us. Life is emancipated, and that’s the beauty of it. We all yearn for this time, to reflect, understand and act better. But no word in our language designates this fruitful use of free time. However, what is not named does not really exist, cannot be defended or valued. Introducing otium into our everyday vocabulary is, finally, granting a value to this time, decisive for our emancipation and our contribution to the common good.