Saturday, December 13, 2008

Learning to “Chillax”

I have learned many new ‘right-now’ words having teenaged children. Recently, words and phrases such as “ownage” and “shut down” have been used in reference to one person’s influence over another. I even came up with my own word, in an attempt to compete with the best of them; it’s “cool-ish,” which I’m told is pretty lame. I suppose I’d need to be a teenager again to get it to fly. No matter.

Another such cool and contemporary ‘right-now’ word is “chillax,” which is the cross between ‘chilling out’ or taking it easy, and relaxing, which means essentially the same thing.

Now, being able to chillax comes easier for some than others. A lot of young people who use the word know how to do it because they don’t truly know what diligence is about; yet, some who’ve discovered diligence in work and in life don’t know how to truly chillax.

It can mean the difference between choosing downtime between tasks instead of ‘compressing time’ by fitting another task in.

It can be about making it to appointments ten minutes early rather than ten minutes late, providing some relaxed composure time.

Just because we have a spare twenty minutes doesn’t mean we should always use that time to do ‘stuff.’

It’s about balance at the end of the day. We can make the most of the time and opportunities we have most of the time, but not always.

Being able to enjoy both work and relaxing is a special skill within the character of a person. It’s not an easy balance to achieve, mind.

We do need to factor in some “chillax” time so we don’t burn out by surviving on adrenalin, suppressing other important biochemicals, and causing health effects and even relational harm.

Copyright © 2008, S. J. Wickham. All Rights Reserved Worldwide.

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