You have the time, you're just wasting it … fact!
You don’t need more hours in the day. You need to stop handing them out like cocktail napkins at a bad party.
The sudden panic of a Monday hangover
I once lost three hours of my life to a YouTube rabbit hole watching a raccoon wash cotton candy in a puddle. It dissolved every time, and the raccoon looked shocked every single time, like the universe had personally betrayed him.
Did I mention I watched that for three hours?
Then suddenly, mid-scroll, mid-sip, mid-life crisis, I realised something very Roman and very real: Seneca was absolutely, devastatingly right.
"It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste much of it."
Seneca, that smug toga-wearing Stoic, was trying to slap us all sober two thousand years ago, and here I am, several drinks in, still trying to make sense of how I can be both middle-aged and feel like I haven't started living yet.
Spoiler alert: it’s not the years I lack; it’s the attention span.
And if that doesn’t hit like a double shot of regret, you haven’t had enough to drink. So, let’s fix that.
Where the hell does the time go?
People complain they don't have enough time like it's a cosmic injustice, or a rare magical thing, like truffle oil or winning the lottery (one day, one day).
“I’d write that novel if I had more time.”
“I’d travel the world if I could take a break.”
“I’d start painting again… if the stars aligned and Mercury wasn’t being such a bitch.”
"I'd start that business if the universe gave me more hours."
The brutal truth is though; you are not too busy, and Seneca would just sip his wine, or the watered-down Roman version, and say:
“You have time. You're just feeding it to the gods of Distraction and Delay.”
Yes, you my friends are feeding that great dumpster fire of modern life: scrolling, doomscrolling, fake productivity, awkward meetings that could've been a text, TikTok dance trends you won’t even remember next week. (And yes, Brenda from HR, your banana bread reel is impressive, but I lost 45 minutes watching you frost that damn thing.)
According to Seneca, it's not that life is short, it's that we squander it like we're immortal, and never really … live.
We act like we have unlimited tomorrows, so we treat today like a gas station snack run. Disposable. Forgettable. Totally missable. And then whine about how unfair life is, and how we never have time to do … well, whatever it is we’re whining about not being able to do.
Truth bomb … we’re not lacking minutes, we’re lacking meaning!
And if you think your Google Calendar is making it better, you’re just scheduling your oblivion more efficiently.
Wasting time like it’s cheap vodka
Let me put this in boozy terms.
Imagine you walk into a bar with a full bottle of the finest scotch, let’s call that your life. Your time. Your essence.
BUT, instead of sipping it slowly, savouring the notes of every second, you just … start pouring shots for everyone. You let Karen from accounting chug half of it while she tells you about her neighbour’s dog. You dump a few ounces scrolling the death spiral of Instagram and pretend it was self-care. Another glug disappears arguing with a stranger about pineapple on pizza … it doesn’t belong there, end of discussion.
Then, you blink, look down, and … oopsie … the bottle’s empty, and you say: “Where did my time go?!"
I’ll tell you where darlings, you poured it away in perfectly acceptable, but utterly forgettable moments of mental sedation. You traded presence for pleasant distractions.
Seneca wouldn’t blame you for the bad stuff. You can have tragedy. Grief. Illness. That’s not a waste. Oh no, that’s life.
The real villain of the peace is what we do on autopilot. Mindless consumption. Meaningless meetings. Running in place. Playing Candy Crush in bed while telling yourself you ‘don’t have time to write poetry anymore’. Living for a weekend that never delivers. Or worse — not living at all.
It’s the banality that eats us alive.
And don’t get me started on the illusion of ‘productivity’. A to-do list longer than your lifespan does not mean you're living. It means you’re panicking. You’re organising your death march into neat bullet points.
Seneca would say:
“The problem isn’t your calendar, it’s your cowardice.”
But isn’t rest important too?
Alright. Let’s slow the rant down. Pour another drink, and breathe.
Not every second needs to be a TED Talk or a journal entry. Even the Stoics weren’t joyless monks grinding spreadsheets with Marcus Aurelius. (Okay, maybe Marcus was. He needed a hug.)
But let’s not confuse busy with fulfilled, there’s a world of difference between intentional idleness and unconscious escape.
Watching trash TV after a long day? Maybe that's your mental bubble bath. Fine. But binging 27 episodes while ignoring your own dreams? That's not rest. That's escapism in sweatpants.
Take naps. Real naps. The kind where you curl up under a blanket and disappear for a while, not the kind where you scroll until your thumb cramps.
Seneca wasn’t against resting. He was against unwitting decay. He believed in reflection. In solitude. In owning your time like it was gold dust. Because it is. Rest should be deliberate. Mindful.
The trick isn’t to hustle every second. It’s to notice it. Use it on purpose. Even wasting time can be sacred, if it’s done deliberately.
So, if you want to spend an hour dancing naked in your apartment to Fleetwood Mac while eating cheese out of the bag, fine. That’s beautiful. That’s sacred. But do it like it means something. Like you chose it. Not like you tripped into it on the way to your own funeral.
Pour your time like it's the last drink
Seneca’s message isn’t a guilt trip. It’s a wake-up call. A philosophical slap across the face. You are not short on time. You are short on courage to claim it.
You don’t need more hours.
You don’t need time management tips.
You don’t need another f***ing productivity app with a fox mascot and pastel interface.
You need to reclaim your damn bottle. Pour it with purpose, and treat our time like it matters. Because it flippin’ well does.
Every day, you are given 24 precious, glorious, ticking hours. That's 1,440 minutes, or 86,400 seconds, of raw, unfiltered potential. And every day, most of us use that gift to… rewatch Season 3 of a show we didn't like the first time.
Stop giving your time away to things that don’t love you back!
If you keep doing that? Well, you’re not living a short life, you’re just living short.
So, here’s what you do:
Read something that sets your brain on fire.
Call your weird uncle and let him ramble about aliens.
Stare at the sky and make up new constellations.
Write a bad poem.
Dance in your kitchen at 2am
Say no to things that drain you.
Say yes to things that scare you.
Live like your bottle’s half-full. Be present. And for the love of Seneca, stop giving your shots away to anything (and anyone) that won’t remember your name tomorrow.
Because time isn’t a thief, and life isn’t short. But if you keep wasting it? It’ll sure as hell feel that way.
Drink up, my friend, it’s time to start living!
Cheers!