If you didn't have to work, how would you spend your time?
Imagine all your basic needs are covered: housing, food, healthcare, and so on. You don't need to work for a living anymore. What would you do with your time?
I know this might sound like a bit of a dreamy question, but it's been on my mind lately, especially as I see so many people working tirelessly day and night. Perhaps it's time for us to slow down and reflect on what truly matters. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this!
Brew beer, fix motorbikes, make bird boxes, travel, walk, read, volunteer, cycle, write software, build electronics, sit in the sun with a cat on me. I can't wait to retire.
That's similar to me! Fix motorcycles, build guitars, travel, read, volunteer more, build electronics (specifically guitar pedals), and play music. I'll actually probably drink less because I won't be trying to cram as much as possible in my limited free time.
This is actually my life right now. I retired from the US military at 38 years old and received a pension which I will collect monthly for the rest of my life. On top of that, they messed me up enough that I got the coveted 100% Permanent & Total disability rating from the VA. So I'm getting free medical and dental for life, plus a monthly paycheck from the VA that's bigger than my pension. My wife also got the same VA deal (she was actually medically separated from the military), so we have double the VA benefits coming in.
All this passive income means we don't have to work for the rest of our lives. I just turned 40, and after spending the last couple years getting settled back into civilian life, I'm starting to invest my free time into hobbies and projects.
My father just passed away a few months ago and I inherited his house (my childhood home) and its 6 acres of property. My dad didn't take care of the house or land (he was a bit of a hoarder), so I'm working on fixing up the house and cleaning up the property. That takes up a lot of my free time during the summer.
I wanted to get involved in my community, so I'm on the parks committee and communications committee for my local township, where I help to improve our local parks and trails, and ensure information about our local area and its events is disseminated to all our residents.
I've been playing a lot of video games lately. I have a steam library of over 3,400 games and I've been picking through my library, trying to discover hidden gems that I've missed. My library is so huge because I've been a Humble Bundle subscriber for a long time now, so I get nearly a dozen games a month. I also play online co-op games with some old childhood friends of mine every week.
My wife and I picked up Duolingo again recently and we're trying to learn a foreign language. I'm juggling both Japanese and Norwegian right now. I learned some basics of Japanese when I was stationed there 2 decades ago and I really love the language, so I'm hoping to master it. Plus, I have living descendants of my ancestors who still live in Norway and I'd like to communicate in their language one day instead of forcing them to use English to communicate with me. I also took 4 years of French in high school, and I was stationed in Germany for a couple years, so I have both of those languages cued up to learn if/when I get bored of my first two.
When I was 13, I discovered I was a prodigy at the piano. I taught myself how to play because I heard Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata and really wanted to be able to play it myself. My wife is actually sore about it because her bachelor's degree required that she take 4 years of piano lessons... and I'm still better than her at piano, without ever having a single lesson. Unfortunately, I haven't touched a piano in nearly 2 decades, so all my skill has gone to waste. So I bought an electric piano recently and plan to re-learn how to play. In my childhood, I had to read sheet music and sort of figure things out myself, but in today's world, there are all sorts of training and tutorial programs and videos online that I can use, so I imagine it'll be super easy to get back into it.
My wife and I watch a ton of movies and TV shows. If we're ever tired and just don't want to be productive for a day, we'll just sit on the couch and binge shows or movies all day. When we're extra lazy, we'll order DoorDash so we don't have to cook. We live in the countryside, about a 15 minute drive from the nearest town, so it's easier to order DoorDash than head into town for food some days. We always tip extra for the drivers, because we know our home is out of the way for them.
When I used to work, I always looked forward to the weekends. But now that I'm retired, I actually find myself hating the weekends and looking forward to weekdays. On the weekends, it's always so busy in town. So many people running errands, eating out with their families, partaking in local events, crowding parks and trails, etc. But during the weekdays, everyone's at work, so the town is quieter. Sometimes I like to go downtown and sit in a coffee shop or restaurant for a few hours and just idly browse my phone or read a book. Or go for a walk or bike in one of our parks and just enjoy the peaceful nature. Or browse some stores, knowing it's just me and the shop owner. I'm not bumping into other customers, I can chat with store owners, etc. I'm starting to understand why old people like to chat up employees so much. It's kind of nice when it's not busy.
As a 100% disabled vet, I get free passes to all national, state, and county parks, and there's a public park with a beach just a couple miles from my home, so I go there in the summer to swim and try to build my strength back up. It's especially nice on weekdays because there's no one there. I can swim laps and not worry about bumping into people. And since it's just down the road from my house, I can head over there anytime, all summer long.
I have a few other hobbies and projects on the back burner. A buddy of mine wants to build furniture and I've always been interested in woodworking, so we've talked about maybe starting up a workshop in my garage. Plus, I was a pro at electrical engineering stuff in my high school years, so I'd be interested in learning more about that field. My house is in rough enough shape, my wife and I have been talking about just tearing it down and rebuilding from scratch, so we're currently designing our dream home right now to see if that's a feasible project. We have enough land that we're interested in learning how to garden. Ideally, being able to live almost completely off our own produce. I'd also like to set up a giant solar panel array in our back field, so we don't have to pay much (if anything) for electricity anymore.
Plus a bunch of other little interests that I want to indulge in over time. In the meantime, I don't have much of a schedule. I go to sleep whenever I'm tired and I get up whenever I naturally wake. I'm a night owl, so that means I'm usually up most of the night and then sleep until almost noon most days.
I dunno what else... I guess I'm just living in the moment now, trying to focus on what makes me happy each day and not worry about trying to be productive or accomplished. I did all that when I was working, and now I can just focus on being comfortable. It's a wonderful feeling, knowing that I have no commitments outside of my control. My wife wants to go back to work one day, but I think I'm done. I much prefer the ability to plan my own days on a whim and not get tied down with long-term commitments. Every day is an adventure that I get to choose.
Damn. Disability notwithstanding, your life sounds pretty fucking sweet (although sorry to hear about your dad's passing)
Your long ass wall of text is why I fucking love this community. Thank you for that incredible read and I wish you and your life the best life together.
I'd finally finish some of my personal projects.
Over the last few years, I've had so many ideas for stuff, both video games and just basic useful software. This is where the curse of being a professional software engineer kicks in. I know that I'm experienced enough to actually make those things but after a full day of work, preparing dinner and getting the apartment in order, there is just not enough time and energy left to get my ass in front of an IDE again. I'd love to have the opportunity, even if just for a year or so to pause my day job and spend my energy on something that is actually mine and has emotional value for me.
On top of that, I have a couple of hobbies that would benefit from having more time. Photography, HEMA (fencing with proper swords), board games, 3d printing and painting miniatures... one thing is for sure, I wouldn't get bored any time soon.
Same. I would absolutely love to park my RV in some beautiful place and just code for months. Likewise, I have three DSLR cameras and two 3D printers I haven't had a chance to use in months/years. I have sooo many hobbies and interests. I don't understand people that get bored. There are never enough hours in a day for me. I could live ten lifetimes and still find things to do.
The solution here is to revert to coding with punch-cards
I know a lady who is retired but wealthy, and she spends her spare time in a sewing club, making really high quality beautiful clothes for low-income families in smaller low-income areas, and provides those clothes to those families for free.
When she told me that the first time, my estimates of her went through the roof.
Find a job I'd love.
I don't want to be useless, but now I wouldn't have to be worried about money.
Work on projects that I think are important instead of just profitable.
Could you answer more vaguely please?
Yes
I tried to be accurate instead of specific.
If I didn't have to work anymore, I'd have more time to explore potential things to work on, so whatever project I'd pick right now would probably not be my main focus after 3 months of settling into my new life.
From where I am right now, I think it would be something to do with language-level features for distributed computing (but not that web3 nonsense). There's a lot of potential to weaken the monopoly power of cloud providers by working on something like that, which is why it's an under-explored area.
But I'd need more people to work with, and some specific use cases to go after. So I would expect the effort to change a lot by the time I actually found the right group of people to work with.
Lets do this! 😀
Hell yeah, I would not be helping puff up a doomed tech product for venture selloff if I was chasing actual utility.
I'd do nothing. Sleep as long as I want, go to bed when I want. Being online, being offline, it really does not matter. Like holidays, but forever.
No offense but wouldn't that be kinda boring (say doing nothing for 10 years)? Maybe you also mean to do other things but didn't mention.
It never got boring whenever I did this in the past (i.e. every holidays and vacations). So I'd say, no.
Once I've recovered from it all and not tired all the time I suppose I'd fix up the house, gardening, designing intricate sandwiches and cocktails and other drinks, write, play video games, hang out with friends, eat, drink, walk, travel... But like 5 days a week I'm gonna hang back, chill, watch tv, play video games (I have a huge backlog even though I game plenty).
oooh. design intricate sandwiches! sounds like a lovely holiday!!
Maybe. But feeling bored would be an amazing feeling for a change.
I have disability income so I'm kind of in this situation already and what I spend my time doing is contributing bug reports to open source software and answering questions for people on how to get started with different things and just helping the communities in general.
I would play the piano more, read all the science fiction (Azimov, Herbert, HG Wells, Orwell, Bradbury, AC Clarke, UK Le Guin...), play Boardgames & Magic the Gathering with my friends, probably start making content for youtube or twitch, make pastry everyday, do gardening and building projects around the house...
The question is, do I have any budget to do all that, or are my basic needs covered but I can't choose where to live, what I eat etc?
Honestly, I don't find any satisfaction in work because I love doing so many things and would rather do one of them for money.
Create and contribute to open source projects.
Write music.
Make little video games.
Write short stories.
Learn a new language.
Basically, a lot of stuff I already do as a hobby, but I would have more time/energy to devote
Realistically? I'd play video games all day and die at 35. I kinda need work for the daily structure and the socialization.
I think many people say stuff like that, and indeed they would for a few months, but after a while people would look for stuff to do, and they tend to turn towards volunteering. That fulfills both daily structure and socialization. Do you think that's something you would eventually do in that case as well?
Reading, hiking, backpacking, cooking, brewing, fixing, loving, caring, dreaming, building, gaming, growing, learning, teaching.
Harder, better, faster, stronger
Probably work on Château Picard. Like living in a hypothetical post-scarcity world, having all of your needs met is not an excuse not to do productive work, or to adopt selfish goals.
Get more sleep
Spend most of my time with my family. We'd do lots of fun day adventures. I'd also get out on my mountain bike more and try to get back into shape. It would also be nice to hang out with my close friends more than once a month.
I already try to collect skills but I'd learn things I don't have the time or energy for currently, like blacksmithing, or designing and producing electronic devices, or music production. I'd probably start a garden and get some chickens and a goat.
Probably dick around in Garage Band.
What are you going to make?
Probably weird a Capella versions of existing songs haha. Though I could connect my midi piano I suppose.
Embrace by creative side even further rather than creating for food and roof and thus limiting my ability to supply and demand.
I just sleep in and play video games and be depressed. It’s not good.
I do that when I don't work but will Monday, or after the holidays. But when I actually had time as in, I'm not going to have to be back to work for a long time, I'd start picking up useful stuff. Turns out the sleep in and games/ depressive state comes from expecting to have to go back to the routine again. That's why how you react to time out when you are still pressured to have to work eventually doesn't give you a good answer to this question.
I agree with this. It takes me weeks, if not months, to really unwind.
A lot of woodworking, a lot of fishing, and a lot of hanging out with family. It would be glorious.
Mostly I’d just do the same thing, but for myself rather than anyone else. I’m almost there, because I started my own company, but I’m still coding to make money rather than coding for fun. It would be great just to write code for fun. Until I’m able to, I’m just working on my email service, Port87. It is really nice to work for myself, at least.
I'd love to learn more. I've wanted to go and do either another degree, or get my PhD, but it's just not realistic with being the only one bringing in money.
Probably finally finish some projects, too, rather than just starting them and losing interest.
Get a couple of dogs and a camper van and travel with my wife, UK, Europe and then further afield.
I would get a house, get a dog and just chill with said dog.
I would do a lot more camping and cycling mostly. really give the bass a red hot shot. tackle my pile of plastic shame
I do shit ton of traveling. Lots of camping and I spend a lot of spare time writing. Also I could knock out my backlog of games.
Depends on income. With more income, I'd travel a lot and do things. With no income, I'd try to make some things, be online and read pirated books :)
Software development and computer stuff in general is my passion. I enjoy doing it as a hobby even after doing it at work. If I didn't have to work for money, I would probably work on some open source software. In fact that's kinda my dream / goal - achieve financial independence and work on open source as I please.
I'd work on my car and my computer/gamedev stuff, and teach others to do the same. Also more gardening.
This answer might be somewhat unusual, but honestly? I would continue working. I like to keep busy, and I feel like I would get bored quickly. Sure, a break might be nice for me to catch up with personal projects, but in the long term, I would like to work.
I suppose it also helps that I'm a rare case where I enjoy the work that I do
I would dedicate more time to exercise. My running would be more consistent and I would likely add yoga and weight lifting.
I would travel a lot more, with big trips to different places. This includes going cross continent in several continents.
I have some ideas for non-fiction writing, specifically an anthology on industrial era technology and how it caused societal change.
I might teach at a community college given my experience and education.
10 hours/day on YT and Netflix
Depressed
Existential dread
Anxiety
Eat
Sleep
(In no particular order).
I'd love to say being productive, learning languages, helping the communities, doing good deeds, exploring the world, trying to fix the wrongs... But as of this moment, the above comment is the realistic answer.
Minus the existential dread most of the time, plus a constant lack of any hope whatsoever but same. Oh and don't forget my eight fucking medications daily, and a few more less often or as needed. And therapy of course. And having regular suicidal/death centric thoughts.
So you have trouble falling asleep and waking up too? That part is fun too.
Go on long walks with a litter bag cleaning parks etc while listening to books and music. Get really in shape. Cook every meal for my family. Write fiction. Get involved in helping local political movements. Attend more protests.
I don't work I quit work at 35 and am now 58. It takes time Toni shacke from the societal indoctrination Misha bleeding work as worthy. I live off a small investment income from investments made decades past (I was buying shares from age 19 and have always been frugal growing up poor, I also own my own modest cottage in a small rural village) Those investments have only grown through no particular perspicacity of mine.
Eventually you can come to understand that freedom is and do what you want. My only regret ? Not quitting earlier, those years were wasted and I can't get them back.
When I work I do my hobbies in my free time when I'm unemployed I do fuck all just playing games and passing the time.
I have a friend who worked his ass off as a teenager and had founded a moderately successful IT business from the back of his garage. He sold his share of the firm at 21 and walked away with a seven digit bank balance.
He's one of those self-proclaimed alpha males who did a lot of stuff like playing video games a lot, martial arts (black belt in two martial arts), gym, partying, etc. He would also still work from time to time, not out of necessity but rather boredom
Unfortunately age and a nasty case of long COVID caught up with him, so he's mainly going back into IT.
I would keep working part time because I love my job (psychotherapist). I would also garden, knit, go camping a lot, learn a musical instrument, write fiction and non-fiction books, have a podcast about mental health, and spend more time with friends. Traveling would also be a favorite.
I think I'd still work because it makes me feel useful to society.
Read, write, gym, combat sports, paint, study, research, try to contribute to science, astronomy, camping, gardening, fishing, and a lot more.
I would work full time on contributing code and development efforts to !boinc@sopuli.xyz , which is a software used by scientists to distribute massive computational workloads to the computers of volunteers for processing. All sorts of medical, physics, and math research gets done through it.
Spending time with my wife
Working on open source projects
Learning new skills, musical instruments
Practicing karate
Spending time with my wife
Probably just developing free & open source software. Doing other things that I enjoy: music production, traveling, idk. I'd definitely make sure to have some goal, something that I can learn or work on. Something that I can achieve, and look back at.
I would stay in my room. That's why I do anyways after work (when I had a job).
I’d keep working for a few years and use every single penny to generate additional passive income. Once I was not just comfortable, but nicely appointed, I’d split my time between working part time, doing stuff to help other people, and being a gigantic slut.
I would spend more time doing charity work and contributing to open source.
I already volunteer for a reproductive justice charity, and I would LOVE to devote more time to making the Linux desktop more accessible for visually impaired folks like me.
I'd probably spend my time learning IT, computer hardware specs and maybe networking.
Maybe build a private file sharing | streaming service for my apartment, and start a website blog.
Perhaps also persue digital art and finally learn how to use vectors.
Maybe also make a YouTube channel and spend my time educating others.
But alas, im bound by my need for an income and will spend the next few years trying to persists as a (almost) new mechanical engineer bachelor.
If I didn't get go work I would be bored for a while until I get used to it. I don't have much content in my life and work is a key aspect in keeping routines and all that jazz.
Having your basic needs covered is cool, but I'd like some money on top of that, too. So work it is.
What I do when I have spare time: write. I just don't seem to have had any spare time recently.
Hmmm I am kinda in this situation now and I have to say I still want to work just not for other people (unless I know them well). I actually am trying to be more active and working on my own stuff makes me feel good and gets me off my ass.
Like almost everyone else on this thread has said, I would still work; just for fulfilment rather than to survive.
Probably other kinds of work.
Like I would love to staff a local convenience store. Maybe some farming for part of the year. Oh and fixing people's appliances would be so cool
under capitalism or an alternative?
If this is a transition from how I live now to never needing to work again, I'm guessing the first 6 months to a year would just be disbelief and slacking. Video games, TV/YouTube, etc.
I'd probably do more of the things I do with my limited off time: gardening, taking care of family & pets, taekwondo.
Honestly have no idea what I'd do once I became accustomed to it. Maybe travel? Participate in local politics more? Volunteer? I would definitely have a sense that I needed to do something to make my life "worth it" that I currently get from working to provide for my family.
It's definitely a result of conditioning, not some fundamental truth of the universe. But nearly 50 years of that conditioning is hard to break overnight.
Working on something I want.
Aside from being lazy and playing video games all day, I would like to learn new skills. I always said I wanted to try woodworking. A lot of my current skills involve being on a computer so I would like at least one that involves tools and using my hands.
Fishing and sailing.
I'd go to school and take every course I possibly could for the rest of my life or until I couldn't.
Garden, fuck, go to the beach, read, dance, cook and ferment, hang out with people. Probably still work some for money if I needed it to buy stuff like drinks or an e-bike, or to travel, I'm sure we'd still have a money economy of some sort. Same stuff I'd do if I could afford to retire. If I was a few years younger, would foster a kid or two.
Oh, and I'm sure I could live a full and healthy life without paid employment, myself.
Mostly more of what I do in my free time now. Mess around trying to make music, watch TV and movies, play video games, read, watch live music, go on hikes and spend time with my family.
I don't understand the people who say they'd be bored if they didn't work. I have more than enough media alone to keep me busy, never mind the amount of things I could pick up or at least try in the extra time. Maybe I'd learn to code and contribute to some open source projects.
The difference would be it would all be on my own terms and truly at my own leisure.
I think it's that they would miss the sense of achievement that comes from a group collaboration on a shared goal. Doesn't mean it needs to be what they do today, but I suspect you'd find these people in community projects if you didn't have to earn.
Yea exactly. This is more evidence that we don't need the threat of starvation and homelessness in order to be productive.
I haven’t worked for almost a year. Mostly, I wake up, play video games, eat, and do some work around the house. There are pretty bad days where I feel worthless and tell myself pretty negative stories, but I’ve gotten much better at ignoring them. Now, I’ll be going back to work soon, and I’m terrified of losing my total free time.
Reading, crafting, learning a language.
Read. Study topics I don’t know about. Learn new skills and try out new experiences. Travel to different places I haven't visited before.
A lot of birdwatching, maybe some music-making, and learning to cook very well.
Probably take a break for a month or two then look for some oss project or activism to participate in, play more music and video games, etc.
Gardening and pickling/preserving foods to start. Writing a novel.
Hike the entirety of the AT and the PCT.
Go bikepacking more frequently. Or go on a months long trip.
Make art - photography, digital art, linocut.
Help friends and family with projects.
That's the short version. There are so many possibilities once you remove the need to be tied to a job/computer for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. I would love to have the freedom to simply not work. I don't want to be rich, I just want to be able to exist without having to work.
There’s plenty of work right there. Art is work. Training is work.
It’s not that you’d want to live without work.
It’s that you’d want to do work important and meaningful to you.
No need to undermine it.
They're would be a lot of time involved in bettering my community. Also a lot of trips and hobbies.
Ive always wanted to study microbiology and try to use it to cure viruses. Dont know why, it just seems so interesting how weird things like cells are and how viruses go through their cycle and how it affects living things. Who knows, maybe in abother life.
Depends on why/how my needs are being met I suppose. If this is a post-scarcity situation where everyone's needs are met and no one has to work, I'd probably keep at my current job. I install and repair nurse call systems (the buttons you push in a hospital to tell the staff you need help) I mostly enjoy the work and someone is going to have to keep doing it. I live in a town with a huge hospital and could easily keep busy without leaving town.
If this situation where only my own basic needs are met and not everyone else's, I wouldn't keep going to that job. Management is kind of a pain and they can certainly afford to train someone who needs the work. I'd still fix whatever kind of shit I knew how to because honestly, I love working with a wrench but, I'd be doing it freelance at that point. I'd probably start by knocking on the doors of local machine shops, fixing machine tools and lasers was more fun than nurse call and if I wasn't tied to one specific brand, I could probably keep busy without driving 4 hours a day (I quit that job because I was tired of travel). If that took off, I'd try to turn it into a business and train someone to pick up the slack so I could still take the occasional vacation without leaving regular customers hanging. If that wasn't enough to keep even just me busy, I'd probably start asking around about other random shit that needed to be fixed. Lots of people deal with broken shit because they can't afford to fix it and if I was only looking to stave off boredom, not having to make a profit, I could probably get it done affordably.
In no particular order:
While I understand the sentiment, there are a lot of jobs out there that are necessary but no one wants to do. If no one had to work society would fall apart. At least at this point in time. Maybe it we ever make it to the startrek universe with boundless energy, replictors, medical devices that just cure you.