One aspect of fast London life I have never understood, for example, is the custom of the gym. Why do people go to gyms?
Tom HodgkinsonFaffing is completely harmless, whereas its opposite - dynamic, purposeful activity - is often very harmful. Faffers do not tend to kill people or make them work 12-hour days or sell them shoddy merchandise or lend them vast sums of money that they cannot pay back.
Tom HodgkinsonWhen walking you see things that you miss in a motor car or on the train. You give your mind space to ponder.
Tom HodgkinsonLabour-saving devices just make us try to cram more pointless activities into each day, rather than doing the important thing, which is to enjoy our life.
Tom HodgkinsonLong weekends at festivals, short weeks at home, all summer long: now that is surely preferable to the immense cost and headache of the nuclear family holiday in the sun?
Tom HodgkinsonSelf-importance is a trap, because the moment we start to think that we actually matter is the moment when things start to go wrong. The truth is that you are supremely unimportant and nothing matters. All of man's striving is for nothing; all effort is wasted. To realize that everything is meaningless is tremendously liberating, since it then leaves us completely free to create our own lives and ignore the plans that others have for us.
Tom Hodgkinson