Ruminations on the time we have

Why is it that in the late hours of the night, you feel as though what you are seeing, feeling, dreaming, thinking matter more than anywhen else? Why is there this rush of clarity, disguising sleeplessness? It's probably all chemicals.

Writers have writer's block... can thinkers get their own kind? Not a rut, not lost, not confused, so much as dead-ended.

Okay, on to a topic - our lifetimes. I believe the average human life-span today to be really long. Really really long. In fact, your own life-span is longer than any length of time you've ever known - though true, that's just a play on ideas. And for 'Life-span' I am putting aside all those who suffer fatal accidents and losses and those who chose to leave the earth early. I'm focussing on those who will be going until into their retirement age. Wowee, that is a LOT of living. I've been around 26 years now, and, to think of all that I have lived in that time feels overwhelming. I know my memory isn't up to much and so my recollections are patchy, but were they clear and comprehensive, I'd have to be one hell of a librarian to keep it all in check. You experience masses and masses of actions, feelings, thoughts, conversations, sensations of your own and witness those of others. Plus you have all the imagined explorations of worlds and times beyond your own in stories, fantasies and dreams. I only have to stop *doing* to witness the passing of just a few minutes and the enormity of how long just one hour or one day really is. And that's a drop/ocean to a lifetime. Yes, some things go slow, very slow, and complicated matters can change and develop over great lengths of time, but I'm not thinking about measuring lengths of time to any quantified scientific scale. I'm not concerning myself with the relative standpoint, for example, where one life is but the fragment of a flicker in the ageing of a star. No, I'm concerned with the great expanse of living time people have.

I come back to it often. Think of a special event or time, or a really great day where you did many things. That was ONE day.

People say how time flies for them or how this week or year seems to have just gone so fast. I never really sympathise well with this. I don't feel like the days or weeks have dragged on, but I am aware they have been there and how long they took to live through. Again, that's not a negative sense of time passing slowly, it's an awareness of the time that has gone by. Maybe people say this because some things from last month or year still 'feel' so close. Maybe people say it because they cannot sense all living they have done in that time - all the things they have seen and done, or think that normal day-to-day living doesn't 'count'.

I do get the sense that some people develop into a way of thinking about the passing of time being demarcated by big or significant events. People seem to use these 'events' as as markers in their memory timelines or in their views of what's to come. Things like their holidays, their friend's party, their friend's wedding, the new football season, that special night out, their anniversary, their buying of a new car, their moving house, or on a smaller scale, their weekend. I am sure there are a number of private experiences that fit into this timeline as important markers too, though they may not be shared in those "So, what have you been up to? / What are your plans?" conversations. These events/experiences are useful for getting a perspective and for fitting memories and plans in the right order. But it's not so good if your expectations or your recollections of life focus just around these. Every day, no matter if an 'event' occurs or not, you still have the 14 or so waking hours, and there's still as much living in it, be it interesting to you or not. Those who've had near-death experiences speak about making the most of the time we have... I see this not as meaning "Do Loads Of Cool Stuff As Much As Possible" but "appreciate and be aware of the time you are living and make the most of it where you can in the way you want to". I think figuring your life by 'events' leaves you in danger of wondering where all the 'other' time went.

I have sometimes wondered, as I'm sure have many, on the changes that would occur were our situation as human beings were different. For example, think of all the ways life, relationships, work and society would necessarily change if:
* people lived half as long as they now do on average and ageing was a faster process (live fast, die young rockstar lifestyles?)
* people lived twice as long as they now do (multiple marriages the norm?)
* people didn't need to sleep (work 12 hours, 12 hours free?)
* people hibernated for months over winter
* ageing was lost and people would only die when they chose to, by accident or disease
* by aid of machines and computers, most human employment was redundant and people needed to only work for two days a week to earn a decent living.

The 'time' I am mainly interested in is our perceived passing of time. The kind that would be affected if we could think faster/slower. If our brains worked twice as fast, time would appear to run slower for us as we could think more things in a shorter time and we could distinguish more detail in movements and sounds. Life would be like watching a film play in slow motion, although maybe we would learn to move/talk faster to compensate. Conversely, if we thought slower then time would pass by very quickly as we would have trouble keeping up with changes around us. Possibly this change in the perceived passing of time is one way in which different animals experience the world (if, indeed, they perceive at all).

The 'perceived time' we have in our lifetime is long. It may not be long enough in some people's estimation to do all the things they would like to do or see all the things they would like to see, but that is more a realisation of how boundless the potentials are for things for us to see and do than it is a realisation of our short lives.

I feel overwhelmed by having already seen and done and lived so much. I feel fascinated by how little I can know the countless things I am still to experience (touch wood).

...

This is the point where I guess I may lose you or you may wish to leave if you are reading this, as it becomes about a personal issue.

I also have a problem with time. When it comes down to the minutes and the hours. I feel happy when time is my own to do with as I please. I feel free when I have it and trapped when I don't. When there are expectations or tasks that I need to do at set times or before certain times I can go into a kind of psychological rebellion against it. A consequence is that I'm not a prompt person, as I want to have more time of my own and try to use as much of it as I can before I have to give it up to something else. So I am often late when I try to do too much and/or do things too late right before when I should be getting going to somewhere else.

And now, the big problem for myself that I keep coming a cropper against: Tasks set to do in my own time, like coursework or homework, where I have to be willing and voluntary about giving my time over to them when I choose to, are almost impossible. And I'm not very good at obeying my own timetables, if I create them I make the rules and I can change the rules.

This isn't all because I think my 'own time' is so valuable or that what I choose to do myself in free time is better or more important; it's a deeper sense of being free and being bound - of satisfaction and of loss. How acute those feelings are varies greatly. It's why I do activities that I can get lost and escape into... where I am no longer aware of time passing, nor do I care.

If we're ever spending time together and it's a quiet time where not a lot is going on or being said, you may sense my discomfort. It's nothing about you, but I start to worry. What should we be doing? What do they want to do? Whose time is this? What is the polite thing to do? Am I wasting their time? Would it be rude and socially inappropriate to do what I want? Can I indulge in a private activity like reading if I then feel like it? Would it be rude to leave the room for a while and do something else, or to call somebody else on the phone? I am not a hyperactive person who always needs to be doing things and on the go, but I can sometimes get very uncomfortable when idling in small company (in larger groups it tends not to matter as activities and conversations flow about the group all the time with people engaging to changing degrees). My awareness of the passing of time (mine and theirs) is heightened.

I know the solution to these problems is to relax about time, let it flow and use it as it makes sense to when you need to or want to. I state these problems not as ones that need a solution to be figured out. I am not confused. I am expressing and explaining what they are - admitting them and hoping from here I can move on or deal with them. Small steps, over a long time... maybe I'll get somewhere better.