No one knows till the time comes, what depths are within him. Few people have learned to structure their psychic energy autonomously, from the inside. In those successful stories where adults had time on their hands, elaborate cultural practices evolved to keep the mind busy. These included complex cycles of ceremonial rituals, dancing, and competitive tournaments that occasionally lasted for days and weeks on end—such as the Olympic games that started toward the dawn of European history. There are so many who forget to think seriously until it is almost too late. The darkest and most contemptible ignorance is that of not knowing oneself. Even if lacking religious or aesthetic activities, at each village provided endless opportunities for exchanging sleazy gossip and elaborate scholarly discussions; under the largest tree of the square, men not otherwise occupied sat smoking their pipes or chewing mildly hallucinogenic leaves and nuts, and kept their minds ordered through redundant conversation. This is still the pattern followed by men at leisure in the koffee shops of the Mediterranean, or the beer halls of northern Europe.

A man can never be respectable in the eyes of the World or in his own, except so far as he stands by himself and is truly independent. Such methods of avoidance chaos in consciousness work to a certain extent, but they rarely contribute to a beneficial quality of experience. As we have seen earlier, human beings feel best in flow, when they are fully involved in meeting a challenge, solving a problem, and discovering something new. Most activities that produce flow also have clear goals, clear rules, immediate feedback—a set of external demands that focuses our attention and makes the demands on our skills. People may really have in them some vocation which is not quite plain to themselves. Now these are exactly the conditions that are most often lacking in free time. Of course, if one uses leisure to engage in a sport, an art form, or a hobby, then the requirements for flow will be present. However, just free time with nothing specific to engage one’s attention provides the opposite of flow: psychic entropy, where one feels listless and apathetic. From the last ills no being can save another; therein each man must be his own savior. The father, son, and holy ghost are one.

The danger of a little knowledge of things is disputable, but beware the little knowledge of one’s self! Not all free-time activities are the same. One major distinction is between active and passive leisure, which have quite different psychological effects. For example, U.S. teenagers experience flow (defined as high-challenge, high-skill moments) about 13 percent of the time that they spend watching television, 34 percent of the time they do hobbies, and 44 percent of the time they are involved in sports and games. When nature biddeth thee to be good and gentle to others, she commands thee not to be cruel and ungentle to thyself. This suggest that hobbies are about two and a half times more likely to produce a state of heightened enjoyment than TV does, and active games and sports about three times more. Yet these same teenagers spend at least four times more of their free hours watching TV than doing hobbies or sports. Similar ratios are also true for adults. Why would we spend four times more time doing something that has less than half the chance of making us feel good? I cannot conceive anything better calculated to excite sympathy than the spectacle of a man devoting his life to self-worship.  

When we asked participants of our studies the question, a consistent explanation begins to appear. The typical teenager admits that biking, or playing basketball, or playing the piano are more enjoyable than roaming though the mall or watching TV. However, they say, to get organized for a basketball game takes time—one has to change their clothes, make arrangements. It takes at least half an hour of dull practice each time one sits down at the piano before it begins to be enjoyable. You may cut off my existence, but you cannot disturb my serenity. In other words, each of the flow-producing activities requires an initial investment of attention before it begins to be fun. One requires such disposable activation energy to enjoy complex activities. If a person is too tired, anxious, or lacks the discipline to overcome that initial obstacle, he or she will have to settle for something that, although less enjoyable, is more accessible. Self-knowledge is thought by some not so easy. Who knows but for a time you may have taken yourself for somebody else? Stranger things have happened.

This is where passive leisure activities come in. To just hang out with friends, read an unchallenging book, or turn on the TV set does not require much in the way of an upfront energy outlay. It does not demand skills or concentration. Thus the consumption of passive leisure becomes all too often the option of choice, not only for adolescents, but for adults as well. No son of Adam ever reads his own heart at all expect by the habit acquired, and the light gained, for some years’ perusal of other hearts; and even then, with his acquired sagacity and reflected light, he can but spell and decipher his own heart, not read it fluently. Of all human dealings, satire is the very lowest, and most mean and common. It is the equivalent in words for what bullying is in deeds; and no more bespeaks a clever man, than the other does a brave one. We are not judges of our own ailments: physicians do not often prescribe for themselves.  Every man may, by examining his own mind, guess what passes in the minds of others. When you feel that your own gaiety is counterfeit, it may justly lead you to suspect that of your companions not to be sincere.