You have no free time

You may think you do, but you have no free time. When we normally talk about free, we mean without cost, unattached, or empty. So Gmail is free, a released balloon is free, and there may be some free space in my closet. None of these apply to time, though, which is never free.

I have already talked some about the cost of time. Time is a scarce resource, and there will always be trade-offs, which are the same as costs. By doing one thing, I pay with the option to do anything else. So time is not Gmail-free.

Time is never disconnected, either. A given hour is always attached to the one before and after it and always lasts exactly 60 minutes. This means that the choices for right now depend on the choices for back then. I cannot, for example, choose lunch at 11:30 in New York and an early dinner 6 hours later in Sydney (given current technology). Time is always attached to the rest of time and is not balloon-free.

Finally, I think when we talk about free time, we intend closet-free. "I am free for lunch" means that my schedule is empty at that time. My schedule is free (empty), I am committment-free (unattached), so I claim that my time is free. Time can never be empty, though. I think the theory of relativity says that time is defined by the thing(s) existing in it, which means that if time were empty, it would cease to exist at all. Therefore time cannot be closet-free.

What do we really mean by free time, then? A free schedule is probably the right meaning. We mean that our time can be used as we see fit, unencumbered by external committments and requirements. I can choose in that moment what to do.

Who cares? Am I not just splitting linguistic hairs? Maybe. However, "free" is a powerful word, and we often let it influence our behavior without meaning to. Having a free schedule can lead us to believe we have cost-free time available to us, which is never true. So the next time you have "free time," consider the cost, make the trade-off, and enjoy it. Just do not think your time is really free.