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Is Scrapbooking a Waste of Time?

 

This post was first written June 2, 2009. I thought it would be nice to share it again.

Have you ever thought to yourself whether or not your time spent scrapbooking is a waste of time?

Is scrapbooking a waste of time?

How should we be spending our time? When we are on our death beds looking back at our life, will we be glad we spent some of our precious life's time making scrapbook pages?

What would happen if we lost all of our scrapbook pages in a hard drive failure or house fire? Would all of that time previously spent be considered wasted? Would we regret ever having taken the time to create?

I often think of it like a balancing scale. The best thing that we could spend our time on is quality time with family, friends, and helping strangers. In other words, the best thing we can spend our time on is people. We make the most difference in the world by our time spent with people. However, in our time spent with people, we create memories. People live on past their death through our memories. So then is it not fitting that we try to preserve those memories? However, if we spend too much time preserving memories, we are not spending time creating them any more. To balance the scale between creating the memories and preserving the memories can be tricky for some, especially for those who begin to get addicted to the natural artistic high of a wonderfully completed layout.

"Time is precious; waste it wisely." Unknown

Do we regret not having asked our parents and grandparents about their memories once they are gone? Do we wish that they would have journaled on scrapbook pages? This does reveal a new perspective on whether or not their time scrapbooking would have been a waste.

Do people who create crafts find it to be a waste of time? Scrapbooking could be considered a craft that can be passed down through time, but doesn't the journaling make the craft more valuable for future generations?

Then there is our God which we must consider. Does He not warn us about collecting treasures on earth, but rather to store up treasures in heaven? I often find myself telling others "what a wonderful treasure you have created!" However, these pages are just earthly treasures.

To reflect even deeper, when a page is journaled and scrapped, is it not "spending our time on people?" It is reaching those people in the future. If our focus is sharing our our treasures in heaven with people in the future, is the scrapping a waste of time? If so, I would consider it a wonderful waste of time! Can we make every page a faithbooking page? Can we make every page a message that we want to send to its future readers that would make a difference in their life?

There are SO many things that we do waste our time on. We waste our time in bed. Is that so bad? We waste our time zoning out in front of the television set. Is that so bad? We waste our time relaxing by the poolside soaking up the sun rays. Is that so bad? Is any time, including scrapbooking, spent on things we enjoy doing a waste of time?

Maybe our problem is not that scrapbooking is a waste of time, but rather time management. How much time do we spend shopping for kits? Downloading freebies? Organizing files? Getting distracted on the Internet social networks? What about those that choose to become designers? Do they not complain that they have no time left to actually scrapbook?

I know that I seem to spend a lot of time managing my website here and often wonder if it is not a waste of my time. However, I do feel that I am helping others through the site, so could it be that bad of a waste of time?

We have to prioritize our time, resist addictions to time wasters, and make goals for those things that are a good way to spend our time. Time management is a difficult thing for most people.

After all of this thought (doesn't your brain hurt too?), what would be the definition of "waste of time?" What constitutes a waste of time? Is it different for each person?

In conclusion, how many question marks are in this writing? Does that mean this topic is such a questionable subject matter? Possibly the best way to get across some points are to ask rhetorical questions that make people think.

Okay, self. Time to stop over-analyzing. You are good at that, aren't you?

 

Copyright Cheryl Rutledge-Brennecke
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