What’s Time Got To Do With It?
How much do you think about time?
Not existentially, just how much you do or don't have available to do something?
Or how long something should take?
The truth is time is slippery. It's completely invisible and our experience of it changes all the time, even though we have clocks, smart watches etc to give us an objective view.
Just listen to how we talk about it; time flies, it drags, it disappears, we save it, we waste it, it even occasionally stands still...
There is clearly an objective element to time, but there's also a subjective one, and this has got me really curious. Because our lived experience of time changes moment to moment based on what and how much we are thinking about it. And this thinking is so normal and unconscious we don't realise it's there, so it looks and feels real.
It's mostly helpful, it helps us organise our days, align with others and plan for the future. But sometimes it gets in the way.
If this is a bit abstract for you take a moment to consider:
Have you ever dreaded doing something because you just know it will take ages, only for time to fly once you got started?
Or felt rushed and pressured just looking at your to-do list, and then the feeling dissipates once you've got into action?
When our background thinking about time is in play we experience time viscerally; as a feeling. And unless we realise that the feeling is telling us about our thinking, and not about the situation, we can end up feeling, pressured or frustrated ultimately making poor decisions or rushing things. When that thinking about time isn't in play it seems to flow naturally or we aren't even aware of it - we feel focussed, as if we have plenty of time.
I've recently had a cold which took a long time to shift. A week in I was not only suffering the cold, but my expectations of how long I should have the cold for. I was frustrated because I should have been back to normal and able to do all the things I needed to do. I didn't rest and carried on, probably prolonging the cold.
When I realised that there was some background thinking running about how long a cold should take, it made me laugh (which, of course, resulted in a coughing fit). Somewhere along the line, I had decided how long it should take to recover, and then because it didn't fit my expectations I was experiencing all sorts of feelings of frustration and taking action accordingly rather than just letting it take its course and looking after myself.
I've started noticing that the same thing comes up in talking to clients about projects, and dare I say at this time of year, forecasting and budgeting. We create timelines, deadlines and working assumptions about how long something will take, but we then (unconsciously) make that a reality with our mind and are surprised when it doesn't work out that way. The problem is not using our minds to project, that's one of the amazing capabilities we have, the problem is that we then act on that thinking as a reality. Instead of reviewing the timeline to understand what's really going on, getting some insight and delivering; we double down on it, giving the power over to our creation.
The good news is that none of this is a problem. There's no need to change your thinking about time, or stop using your mind to plan and project, you can't even if you wanted to. Instead, just notice when, and how much, you're running your background thinking about time, and when you notice its in play, ask yourself if it is helping or hindering.