According to the Free Dictionary, leisure is:
1. Free time when one is not working or attending to other duties.
2. Relaxation or activities engaged in during such time: the pursuit of leisure.
3. At leisure -
a. having free time for ease, relaxation, etc
b. not occupied or engaged
c. without hurrying
According to the Thesaurus, synonyms for leisure are:
Convenience, recreation, relaxation with quiet and pause coming way down the list
However, if leisure is meant to rejuvenate and refresh us, it must have something to do with our inner being....our core. Our inner core has to feel rejuvenated, maybe even renovated and restored...it has to be made to feel new again from its jaded, tired condition. In that case, these words make sense:
'Leisure, then, is a condition of the soul – (and we must firmly keep this assumption, since leisure is not necessarily present in all the external things like "breaks," "time off," "weekend," "vacation," and so on).
Leisure is an inner absence of preoccupation, a calm, an ability to let things go, to be quiet. Leisure is a form of stillness - only the person who is still can hear, and whoever is not still, cannot hear.'
(I got these words from Brain Pickings)
Sharing this poem by William Henry Davies
Leisure
What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.
No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep or cows.
No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.
No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.
No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance.
No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began.
A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.