A friend sent me a link to this great articlewritten by a busy working mom who goes out to try and test out a theory that working mothers have 30 hours of leisure time each week. Apparently John Robinson, a sociologist who has made a career of time studies, claims that even though many more moms now work than a few decades ago, we still have 30 hours of leisure time each week.

This sounded insanely wrong to me when I read it and (sorry to give away the punch line) the article’s author didn’t find her 30 weekly hours either, even aftertracking how she spends her time. It was funny to read some of her observations and realize that many of us crazy busy working moms think of things similarly. For example, she described her 30 minutes of exercise a day as leisure time. I do the same for my time at the gym. But c’mon, is it really leisure? John Robinson disagrees, and if I am honest about it, so do I. It IS something I am doing for me, but it’s not relaxing in the same way that a leisurely walk or a few hours reading can be.

I tried to think about my average week and figure out how much leisure time I have. I do try to take a 1/2 hour walk as often as I can, which realistically is about 3 or 4 times a week. So let’s call it 2 hours. My husband and I usually watch a movie or go out to the movies or dinner with friends at least once a week — that’s leisurely, so let’s call it 4 hours. And in the past few months I’ve gotten pretty disciplined about taking at least one night a week just for myself — spending it with a friend or getting a latte and reading some magazines — so let’s be generous and call that 4 hours. And for the fun of it let’s throw in some random leisure time here and there and add it up to a few hours. So 12 hour total of weekly leisure time and this is for a mom with just one kiddo. 30 hours? I don’t think so.

(My first inclination was to add sleep to my leisure time, because I really do think of it as that. But I’m pretty sure what the sociologist meant by leisure time was something relaxing you did while awake.)

The article did have some interesting observations related to how we treat leisure time. The author points out, for example, that society used to value leisure a lot more and rich people who could indulged in a lot of leisure and not a lot of work. These days, as she writes, even billionaires have insanely busy schedules. Work has become much more prominent as a value for many of us and I can attest to the fact that I do derive a lot of pride/satisfaction/self-assurance from accomplishing a lot at my job. There are definitely hours I spend working that I could be spending in more leisurely ways.

I am not sure I need 30 hours but I could definitely use a bit more leisure time. And I think like with everything else, I could create some more if I were more focused on it. There are times when I could have a few hours to myself on the weekend but my separation anxiety doesn’t let me leave my kiddo whom I don’t see as much during the week because I work. And I could definitely feed my family more healthy prepared and frozen meals or takeout instead of cooking til midnight a few times a week; that would free up some leisure time. Sure, less work and household/childcare responsibilities would give me more time, but I’m pretty sure I am a contributor to my too-little-leisure time life.

What about you — how much leisure time do you think you have per week to do what you enjoy and what’s relaxing? Do you think you could have more if you made it a priority?