V TENNIS AND THE IMMORTAL SOUL

In Chapter V of “How to Live on Twenty-Four Hours a Day,” the author focuses on how individuals typically spend their daily hours, scrutinizing the inefficiency of common routines, particularly highlighting the misuse of morning hours spent on reading newspapers during commutes. The author criticizes this practice, viewing it as a wasteful dispersion of precious time, given the haste in both the production and consumption of newspapers. Instead, the author advocates for the utilization of this time in personal reflection and intellectual growth, suggesting newspapers be read in lesser, fragmented moments throughout the day.

The narrative then transitions to the evening routine post-work, portraying a typical scenario where the individual returns home fatigued, engages in aimless activities like socializing, playing cards, or aimless reading, only to find that hours have slipped by unproductively. The author argues against the notion that fatigue necessitates such lethargy, instead proposing that evenings be arranged more purposefully. By reframing one’s mindset to reject the idea of being too tired and by restructuring the evening to avoid being bisected by dinner, one could carve out a significant chunk of time for intellectual or personal development.

The author suggests starting with allocating an hour and a half every other evening to activities that stimulate and engage the mind considerably. This proposal is not to fill every evening with rigorous mental exertion but to initiate a routine that sees time as a valuable resource to be employed judiciously for self-improvement. The underlying premise is that by re-examining and adjusting our daily routines, especially those entrenched routines surrounding work and leisure, we can reclaim and utilize time more effectively for our intellectual and personal growth.

Through this chapter, the author maintains a style that combines practical advice with a critical examination of common societal norms regarding time management, aiming to provoke the reader into recognizing and leveraging the unused potential of their daily routines. The narrative is consistent in its approach to challenging perceived notions of tiredness and leisure, advocating for a more conscious and purposeful allocation of one’s daily twenty-four hours.