Martha is doing something genuinely good. She is hosting. Somebody has to cook, and the people who say this passage is anti practical have never had guests.
Jesus does not tell her the work is worthless. He says she is worried and upset about many things.
That is the diagnosis. Not activity. Anxiety. The problem is not the meal, it is what the meal has started to mean, and the resentment that shows up when she looks at her sister and needs somebody to validate the cost.
Only one thing is necessary. Everything else is optional in the specific sense that it can be dropped without the day collapsing.
And Mary has chosen the good portion. Chosen. It was available to Martha the whole time, in the same house, on the same afternoon. Nobody was keeping her out of the room but the list she had decided could not wait.
