Life & Leisure of the Creative Class

Florida uses this portion of his book to delve into how our society has changed their perception of leisure time.  He speaks to new activities that have become pastimes for the creative class.  Among some of the activities that he points out as being new age in terms of leisure is physical activity like adventurous sports or running or biking.  No longer are people only interested in the uppity organized sports and "ostentatious time-killing activities" like golf.  Leisure activity is actually for leisure, and the creative class is partaking in it because they enjoy it.  Rather in the past, Florida seems to insinuate, that people partook in activities for social gain and other motives.  I would have to agree with Florida that people in today's culture are more likely to find what they like to do and embrace it.  I really liked his example of running and how in the past middle-aged men would not be caught dead exercising in public.  My how the times have changed.  It is interesting because more often than not today we find that unique activities and interests are valued characteristics.  We are often drawn to people who have a flair for the dramatic and are not afraid to be themselves.  In that, accompanies unique leisure activities.  It opens our own creativity and prompts us to be more interesting people.  What we consider free time has also expanded, according some of the statistics Florida presented.  In 1965, people had an average of 35 hours of free time, where in 1995 - we increased that to 41 hours per week.  That seems like an awful lot for a workaholic society.  This leads me to believe that we are in fact meshing the two together - believing that some of the work we do is actually so enjoyable, we categorize it as "free time".

Our culture has become one that expects to be in awe and entertained with everything we do.  The internet has provided us with a wealth of creativity and an open communication amongst people in the world who display their creativity via blogs or the like.  Florida says, "There is much that seems good about living a quest for experience...'You can't just enjoy a ballgame; you have to go to a state-of-the-art $500mm stadium for a multimedia circus that distracts you from the very game you paid to see.'"  This is so true and resonates with me in regards to my generation.  We are numb to the amazing feats humans have been able to create.  And in the process, we are no longer impressed with anything - even come to expect the impossibly imaginative.  We are complacent and care more about the bells and whistles that make something "interesting" than caring actually about the simplistic things in life.  Our minds are constantly battling with information overload and we are always wanting more - doing more. It makes me wonder where can our culture go from here?  In a world we are already so advanced in so many ways and have access to so much information - it scares me to think what is possible in the future!