Tag: now

As we get older, time becomes less. We have less of it.

Having a conversation about the sense of time, and the differences in the perception of time we had as children – summer lasted forever – and now as adults – the children are grown! – whoever I was talking with said that our perspectives shift with age because of the contexts we have in our brain. Children are more immediate, and adults have touching points. These touching points are referential – we use them to frame our reality.  Children are developing memory, while we are full of them. Older people can remember their childhood often more vividly than they can recall the day before.

I know for me this is certainly true. And the result is that I forget about the immediacy of living – the moment of now. Instead, my head is filled with plans and structures because of all the things I need to do now.  If I don’t get certain things done now, I will miss out on windows, whether for opportunity or survival.

“Being here now” has so many different meanings – the nowness of chores and things that have to be done (which is where I am at today with bills and job applications) – and, of course, living and doing in the moment. I forget this so often that my sense of spontaneity is vanishing, and the horizon of my life is hurtling toward me at an increasingly rapid pace. I schedule the “thou shalts” and forget the “let’s”.  How sad to think that I may lose what time I have left because I forget the joy of the moment and structure my life with tasks and chores and must-do-its.

I fear I am becoming increasingly dreary.