Why do we buy things to save time and still end up with no time?
Dishwasher, washing machine, robot vacuum, deliveries, digital banking, online shopping and artificial intelligence. Almost every previous generation would envy how much time our technology is supposed to save. So where did the time go?
We work more, remain available more, respond faster and consume more information than earlier generations could imagine. Sukkot interrupts the race with a simple command: sit. “You shall dwell in sukkot for seven days” (Leviticus 23:42). The Sages explain: “dwell as you live” (Sukkah 28b). Not achieve. Dwell.
There is a difference between free time and a free mind. A person can be on vacation while answering dozens of messages. He can sit with his children while mentally remaining in the next meeting. Perhaps the problem is not only that we have no time. Perhaps some of the time is there, but we no longer know how to be inside it without filling it immediately.
We invented countless devices to save time. No one has yet invented a device that makes us use the time we saved for the things for which we wanted to save it in the first place.