One of my blogs from five years talked about the "inner child". Actually, it was more that -- within us -- about the reality that we still have that 5-year-old and that 15-year-old and such other periods in our lives. But, there is another aspect of time and that is our perception of it as we move through our lives.
When we are young, perhaps five years old, then that final month until the holidays takes forever. But, at a modest sixty-five years of age, that month takes only an instant. One way of approaching this difference is that, at age five, a month is 1/60 of our life so far. And, at 65, a month is only 1/780 of our life so far. So, that period of a month is proportionately much longer when we are young.
But the difference in perception does not necessarily depend on chronological measurements. Time is, after all, a human definition according to perception. The amount of experiences may change the perceptions also. In general, a 65-year-old would be expected to have more experiences than a five-year-old. But, a five-year-old who is growing up in a war zone will have different (and perhaps more) experiences from a five-year-old growing up on a rural farm or a five-year-old growing up in a poor section of a large urban center. Those experiences will vary according to physical, social, and societal environments. And those experiences will also affect perception of time. I propose that future time perception is shortened by greater amounts of experience.
But an hour to that five-year-old is not always the same. That hour until school lets out is not the same as an hour until they have to leave an amusement park. Yet the time that has elapsed on a clock indicates the same number of minutes. What is the difference? One way of looking at it might be that of desire. When you are anticipating, or desiring, an event in the future it seems slower. When you dread it, it seems slower.
But that may be a matter of focus. When you focus on that future event then you are NOT focusing on what is going on from minute to minute. Those things that are happening in the now shorten the distance to the future if they are focused upon. Ride the roller coaster one more time. Read one more chapter of that fantastic book you hope will never end. If your focus is on other things then that future period of time can come so quickly. In the world of work, that means that if you are doing something interesting and challenging, which requires focus, then quitting time gets forgotten (for better or worse).
All of the above is about the speed of advancing towards the future. But what about the past? Well, so far at least, there is no going back in time to the general past. But OUR past? Every time we find ourself thinking about something that once happened, we are on a personal time trip. Within dreams, they may vary and become more detailed. It is even possible to reach a depth where time is perceived as being re-lived. And, unfortunately, some can get stuck and disappear from the present.
As best we know, time goes along with entropy -- as the universe decays and becomes more chaotic, our perception follows along. But, within that general direction, our perception of time can do many things. What is particularly interesting about time to you?
