Being busy isn’t a personality trait

The real reasons you’re too busy for anything (hint: it’s not your calendar)

If you’re in your 20s, childless, aren’t anyone’s sole caretaker, and working a 9-5 job, there’s no way you’re that busy.

“But Zoe!!! Work is INSANE right now and I’m trying to spend time with my friends and family and significant other and have hobbies and get groceries and do laundry and cook for myself! My life really is SOOO busy!!”

Join the damn club.

Everyone is busy, so no one is. There are exceptions but from my perspective, the people who are truly busy are the ones who are so good at managing their time that no one notices how much they have going on. The busiest people I know are the ones who aren’t making it everyone else’s problem.

I think that busyness excuse can be a convenient front for two things:

1. Running away from painful emotions

2. The impulse to feel or be seen as important

The desire to run from pain

I see busyness used as an excuse by people who are: 1) deeply hurting and are afraid of the intimacy associated with community or partnership so they hide under the cover of busyness or 2) people who are so afraid of their emotions that they feel like they need to be busy 24/7 to avoid experiencing a single negative feeling.

When I was dating, I experienced the “I’m too busy to date rn” guy several times. So have many of my friends. When this happened to me, I found it extremely rude, the subtext being that I’m just a girl doing her silly job and meaningless hobbies while the guy is off doing lifesaving work at Software Development Company and is an integral part of his adult acapella group, making him too busy to go on a date once a week. I really don’t care to hear about how difficult it is for a grown-up to manage more than one activity they signed up for. It’s offensive to people who regularly manage multiple obligations at a time without making it everyone’s problem.

Undoubtedly, the person who suddenly becomes too busy to date could just be not that into you. But when you’ve been seeing someone and they suddenly withdraw and blame it on their crazy schedule, I think it can also be because they get scared of something too real due to past hurts.

The moment things start to get real with someone is a great time to jump ship. When things get real, people expect things of you. This can be too big of an ask for people who aren’t ready to be seen as anything less than a fun, perfect person. Relationships are mirrors, they force us to confront our flaws and imperfections in many ways. When you opt out, you aren’t required to reflect.

While I haven’t been guilty of being “too busy to date” per se, I’ve been guilty of wanting to keep so busy that I don’t have a second to feel. Sometimes this desire feels necessary to survival. If you’re in the throes of depression or grieving a loss, you don’t want endless time to stew on everything going wrong. During periods where most of my feelings were negative, I needed to stay busy to keep the horrors at bay. Entering a flow state at work, becoming enraptured with friends, or escaping through a movie was a lifeline for me. But busyness and distraction don’t work forever. Eventually, the feelings bubble up and the pressure you put on yourself to keep them down will only make things worse.

Both cases point to an urge to run from one’s unpleasant feelings, which is ultimately an act of self-protection.

The need to feel important

When I ask a coworker how they’re doing and they reply, “super busy!” I automatically think they’re working on Very Impressive Tasks. I’m totally guilty of associating busyness with importance. But a lot of the time, the impulse to incessantly bitch about being busy stems from insecurity and self-preservation.

In bureaucratic organizations, ones with many systems, departments, and people, the need of a handful of individuals to feel important will get in the way of innovation and progress. This becomes obvious when everyone who was “too busy” to fix a broken system suddenly have time and energy to get in the way when someone offers to do the work themselves. An inefficient system keeps insecure people busy, and therefore, feeling important.

The people at work constantly complaining about being “too busy” are often the ones who volunteer themselves for extra tasks or say yes to projects they don’t have the capacity for. This speaks to a need to feel important or be seen as indispensable to upper management. You can make yourself seem super important at work when you lack boundaries or have poor time management skills!

The workaholic types are the guiltiest of all. If you primarily identify with your job for self-esteem, you have to believe that what you’re doing is important. Busyness, even when caused by menial tasks or bullshit meetings, still equates to importance.

Outside of the workplace, it’s beyond annoying to run into an acquaintance who “hasn’t left the house in sooooo long” because work has been “sooooo crazy!” I find that these types of people are generally snobby, self-important assholes who assume you just sit on your couch all day twiddling your thumbs. Frankly, I REALLY don’t want to hear about how busy you are, especially if you show zero interest in my life.

Worse than acquaintances going on about their Busy and Important lives, it can feel downright hurtful when friends, family, or a significant other can’t make time for you. Especially when you want your loved ones to be present during big life events like birthdays and holidays. I know it's difficult to prioritize my time, knowing I won’t be able to do all the things I want to do. Still, I get hurt when people can’t or don’t make time for me. It sucks to feel like you are a lower priority in someone else’s life than they are in yours. This hurt can easily morph into anger when I feel like someone thinks they’re too good, too busy, or too important to make time for me.

We make time for the things that matter to us. Life comes up and priorities shift so I get it. No one should try to pour from an empty cup. It’s impossible to say yes to everything you want to do in this life. Sometimes it isn’t about being busy at all, but about being mentally occupied with one’s own stress. Sometimes I’m juggling too many activities and genuinely have little free time. Other times, I’m mentally at capacity due to one big thing taking up my energy. Maybe you’re drained. Maybe you need to slow down.

Really, I think we might be misusing the phrase “I’m busy” when the truth is closer to “I’m overwhelmed.” So please stop saying that you’re busy and tell me how you really feel.