Running to Stand Still

No, I am certainly not saying that I'm a heroin addict, if that is the automatic connection that came to mind with this blog post. However, I think there is something about the irresistible, addictive nature of being busy, or at least being perceived that way.
I know many people think I'm relatively lazy, when they compare some of my work weeks to their own. Or they assume that I must have heaps of free time to sit and daydream. Or they wonder why I don't have time to watch TV every night, like themselves.
Maybe I am very inefficient at my tasks, that I don't know. Maybe I have way too many different things on my plate. That, I think is also a definite possibility. The reality is that on average, I actually work more than the usual 40 hour-work week. There, I said it. My choice to seemingly work less hours than you think a physician should work actually leaves me with working just a bit more than the average worker. If I did work "full time" (whatever the heck that means), I suspect my work schedule would look similar to as it did when I was a resident, and that is an untenable situation.
Carrying much on one's plate inevitably gives one indigestion. In my spare brain moments, I'm thinking briefly about what items on my plate are so important to me that I still want to keep nibbling at them. Problem is, like a really good potluck, you actually want to make sure you keep a bit of everything on your plate. Sigh. Perhaps if I did become a heroin addict, picking and choosing would become rapidly a moot point...