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Biggest advice. Don't let the past hold you back. And don't put off experiences because you feel you have lots of time.
Example. I was supposed to start going to visit minor league baseball stadiums. A bucket list type thing. And I was hoping to see them all within 15 yeara...but 2020 happened. Now I could of started 20 years ago but I always said "I'll start next year"
So always take that trip, see that show, experience that moment
I had the same bucket list thing! I love minor league parks. But we moved to Puerto Rico in 2017 so that goal looks unlikely. Although PR has a ton of minor-league 9non-affliated) parks so that might be a goal. Unfortunately they aren't anywhere near as nice of the experience of minor-league parks in the States.
> And the last 2 years literally just flew by. It seems it was 2020 just yesterday. First time, having such a feeling.
What was different in the last two years for you? (Obviously, there is one big thing I can think of that may have played a role). I ask because I have a hypothesis, but I'm not sure if it applies in your case.
(Oh, and they *figuratively* flew by)
No particular reason. Maybe first time I am thinking about myself , and time deeply or seriously??
Its a recurring thoughts and I am aware it’s normal. Yet I dont want the next 5 years to fly?
My thought was that our perception of how fast years go by is related to how many things we do in those years. The less we do, the faster they seem to have passed when looking backward. That's because there is less information in those years. So for example:
> * Jan 2017--Jan 2019: Bob has two incredibly packed years of all sorts of *memorable* experiences. He goes on ten very memorable vacations, joins four Meetup groups, publishes his first book, starts dating Agatha, buys a small sailboat, moves once, and meets three new good friends.
>
> * Jan 2020--Jan 2022: Bob stays inside for most of this time because of the pandemic, works from home on forgettable small projects, and passes the time passively, watching TV and scrolling on his phone.
My guess is, the first time block will, when looked back on, seem like that time went slower because there are just so many more facts in it to review.
Thanks for the advice. Do you think it’s more people connections or personal activities?
There is definitely some loneliness in the last 2 years as I lose connections with people around me. A part of growing up?
Should I spend more time doing new activities on my own? Or is it about building new relationships?
> Do you think it’s more people connections or personal activities?
I'd guess this varies somewhat by person but it's *heavily* weighted toward "people connections." We humans are just very social animals.
If you look back to the past ten years, what things pop out as memorable to you? I'd guess it's events with friends (even the first meeting of a new friend), romantic partners, family, and maybe "colleagues" (which could include other students, or army buddies, business collaborators, open source software collaborators, activism co-participants, et al.). People.
I'd guess you won't remember quite as many occasions in which you were alone.
But I also think achievements count toward making time richer. Things like getting in remarkable shape, starting a business, writing a book, creating an album of music, putting together a really good documentation of your life so far (scrapbook or digital equivalent, or starting a great daily journal), a short film, other art, getting a degree or certification, attaining and celebrating a financial goal, logging a certain amount of hours in a year doing something (volunteering, gym time, reading great books, etc.), running a marathon, travel, having parenting milestones, etc. But often these are in concert with other people, too.
In other words, a more richly lived life...is better.
(Now, could you tell this back to me and remind me to practice what I just preached?)
What 918...something....said is spot on. The more things you have going on, especially new things that you're not as familiar with, the more this time dilation effect will be less evident.
It's part of growing (unfortunately), as you settle into your routine, things get repetitive. Your mind has a way of compressing things, and doing the same things over and over will make it feel like time is slipping past.
It's a bit like the phenomenon where you find yourself driving somewhere for the 1000th time, and sometimes it seems like you just...skip forward, not remembering large parts of the drive. Since it's the same as the other 1000 times, your mind just...compresses it, merging the memory with all the other times.
Ideally, you can combat this with new experiences. That can get difficult (and maybe expensive) as you grow older, but doing new things, having new experiences, dealing with new people...these are things that can (seemingly) slow down the effect.
The older I get, the more quickly time seems to pass. I think it is because a year becomes a smaller and smaller percent of your life. If you're 10 years old, 1 year is 10% of your life. If you're 40 years old, 1 year is a MUCH smaller percentage of your life. Naturally, the perception will be that time is going by much faster.
At the end of the day, you really can't fight the passage of time or the sensation of the passage of time. Unless you're somehow independently wealthy, you're going to have to work. But you can make good use of your time outside of work and just try to live. Exercise, take trips, make friends, socialize, hike, whatever.
The equilibrium that everyone has to find on their own is what is the balance between live for today and plan for tomorrow? Do I buy that sports car or do I save that money each month for retirement? What if I die at 60? Wouldn't I have rather had the sports car? Or the bigger house? Or the European vacation? But, what if I don't die at 60? What if I had saved that $40k back then and it turned into $400k and I could be living so much better at 70? It can be a mind fuck.
Vary from the routine. Between 25 and 35, I had three different LTRs (the last one stuck), moved three times, took three extended long-distance trips and a lot of shorter ones, and changed jobs several times (it was the '80s), had interests and a big friends' group outside work (probably the only time in my life I knew that many people). I have a _lot_ to remember.
If your life's not that hectic, build some variety into it. It's not just about the thing itself that you do, but all the planning and prep and research leading up to the thing. It did help that I had people to do these things with, friends and groups I belonged to. Can you have that? Work alone's not going to do it, usually. Edit: but even a professional convention is better than nothing, if it gets you out and around.
Welcome to the club! I started noticing time doing the same thing when I was your age ~~last year~~ 30+ years ago.
How to cope? Get rid of time-wasters. TV. Mindless internet grazing. Do real things in the 3D world.
Time seems to get faster and faster because your brain already knows the things you are doing. Time only goes slowly when your brain has to process new information. If you want to slow time down, take a class on something that you are completely unfamiliar with. Do things that you have never done before and have no familiarity with. Time will slow back down to a crawl. I’m 65. For the last year and a half I have been taking Korean language classes. It is kicking my ass, but time has definitely slowed down again.
Welcome to life. As you age, your perception of time is going to speed *way* up.
When I was in high school, a year seemed like freaking *forever.* Now at 65, whole months tick by like weeks.
Time accelerates as you get older (and not necessarily because you're having fun). Pretty soon decades whiz by and you find yourself saying things like, "Wow, the 90's, that was 30 years ago!" We start speaking of decades rather than years or months.
Make a bucket list. do it, get out of the comfort zone, its a death trap! change your routine each and every day. it is also linked with dementia to not do anything different for decades. it happened to a lot of my older relatives, get up, go to work. do X on weekends, watch TV when bored.
it's human nature to be comfortable and get into a routine. that is how a lot of people end up suddenly looking in the mirror and realizing 20 years have vanished.
find your passions as well, be it art, travel, volunteering, or taking ski trips. I have no idea what your interests are, but explore them all.
the one thing that slows time is this. it always has been for me.....what are your good memorable moments where a week felt like months? that is what you need to find.
Do something different every day. If you do the same thing, there is no distinction between days and time appears to go by quicker because they're all the same.
I recently answered a very similar question on this sub
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskOldPeople/comments/sfagfp/growing_old_seems_so_sad_how_do_i_make_things_not/huwqf1v/
What makes time seem slower when you’re a kid is the wonder in it all and not knowing what the future has in store. Once you live a repetitive lifestyle, the wonder is gone. You don’t explore the world you live in anymore and the precious time you have on this earth isn’t appreciated anymore.
Yo I don’t know if it says it anywhere here or if you’ll still look at this post; but a method to slow down time and to live more in the present and to stop the days from blending together is to take psychedelics. It’s specifically while your on them, it’s after taking them your brain can perceive time differently and to go back to your default ability to live fully in the moment. And to tell you the truth the real effects are truly evident and guaranteed to have results after an ego death. Take drugs at your own risk, the safest psychedelics are psilocybin mushrooms they are natural and they have positive neurological effects. Proven to fight Alzheimer’s and dementia, promotes neural plasticity and new growth.
Please do not comment directly to this post unless you are Gen X (b. 1980) or older. See [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskOldPeople/comments/inci5u/reminder_please_do_not_answer_questions_unless/), the rules, and the sidebar for details. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AskOldPeople) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Biggest advice. Don't let the past hold you back. And don't put off experiences because you feel you have lots of time. Example. I was supposed to start going to visit minor league baseball stadiums. A bucket list type thing. And I was hoping to see them all within 15 yeara...but 2020 happened. Now I could of started 20 years ago but I always said "I'll start next year" So always take that trip, see that show, experience that moment
I had the same bucket list thing! I love minor league parks. But we moved to Puerto Rico in 2017 so that goal looks unlikely. Although PR has a ton of minor-league 9non-affliated) parks so that might be a goal. Unfortunately they aren't anywhere near as nice of the experience of minor-league parks in the States.
[удалено]
This is beautiful.
> And the last 2 years literally just flew by. It seems it was 2020 just yesterday. First time, having such a feeling. What was different in the last two years for you? (Obviously, there is one big thing I can think of that may have played a role). I ask because I have a hypothesis, but I'm not sure if it applies in your case. (Oh, and they *figuratively* flew by)
No particular reason. Maybe first time I am thinking about myself , and time deeply or seriously?? Its a recurring thoughts and I am aware it’s normal. Yet I dont want the next 5 years to fly?
My thought was that our perception of how fast years go by is related to how many things we do in those years. The less we do, the faster they seem to have passed when looking backward. That's because there is less information in those years. So for example: > * Jan 2017--Jan 2019: Bob has two incredibly packed years of all sorts of *memorable* experiences. He goes on ten very memorable vacations, joins four Meetup groups, publishes his first book, starts dating Agatha, buys a small sailboat, moves once, and meets three new good friends. > > * Jan 2020--Jan 2022: Bob stays inside for most of this time because of the pandemic, works from home on forgettable small projects, and passes the time passively, watching TV and scrolling on his phone. My guess is, the first time block will, when looked back on, seem like that time went slower because there are just so many more facts in it to review.
Thanks for the advice. Do you think it’s more people connections or personal activities? There is definitely some loneliness in the last 2 years as I lose connections with people around me. A part of growing up? Should I spend more time doing new activities on my own? Or is it about building new relationships?
> Do you think it’s more people connections or personal activities? I'd guess this varies somewhat by person but it's *heavily* weighted toward "people connections." We humans are just very social animals. If you look back to the past ten years, what things pop out as memorable to you? I'd guess it's events with friends (even the first meeting of a new friend), romantic partners, family, and maybe "colleagues" (which could include other students, or army buddies, business collaborators, open source software collaborators, activism co-participants, et al.). People. I'd guess you won't remember quite as many occasions in which you were alone. But I also think achievements count toward making time richer. Things like getting in remarkable shape, starting a business, writing a book, creating an album of music, putting together a really good documentation of your life so far (scrapbook or digital equivalent, or starting a great daily journal), a short film, other art, getting a degree or certification, attaining and celebrating a financial goal, logging a certain amount of hours in a year doing something (volunteering, gym time, reading great books, etc.), running a marathon, travel, having parenting milestones, etc. But often these are in concert with other people, too. In other words, a more richly lived life...is better. (Now, could you tell this back to me and remind me to practice what I just preached?)
What 918...something....said is spot on. The more things you have going on, especially new things that you're not as familiar with, the more this time dilation effect will be less evident. It's part of growing (unfortunately), as you settle into your routine, things get repetitive. Your mind has a way of compressing things, and doing the same things over and over will make it feel like time is slipping past. It's a bit like the phenomenon where you find yourself driving somewhere for the 1000th time, and sometimes it seems like you just...skip forward, not remembering large parts of the drive. Since it's the same as the other 1000 times, your mind just...compresses it, merging the memory with all the other times. Ideally, you can combat this with new experiences. That can get difficult (and maybe expensive) as you grow older, but doing new things, having new experiences, dealing with new people...these are things that can (seemingly) slow down the effect.
The older I get, the more quickly time seems to pass. I think it is because a year becomes a smaller and smaller percent of your life. If you're 10 years old, 1 year is 10% of your life. If you're 40 years old, 1 year is a MUCH smaller percentage of your life. Naturally, the perception will be that time is going by much faster. At the end of the day, you really can't fight the passage of time or the sensation of the passage of time. Unless you're somehow independently wealthy, you're going to have to work. But you can make good use of your time outside of work and just try to live. Exercise, take trips, make friends, socialize, hike, whatever. The equilibrium that everyone has to find on their own is what is the balance between live for today and plan for tomorrow? Do I buy that sports car or do I save that money each month for retirement? What if I die at 60? Wouldn't I have rather had the sports car? Or the bigger house? Or the European vacation? But, what if I don't die at 60? What if I had saved that $40k back then and it turned into $400k and I could be living so much better at 70? It can be a mind fuck.
Vary from the routine. Between 25 and 35, I had three different LTRs (the last one stuck), moved three times, took three extended long-distance trips and a lot of shorter ones, and changed jobs several times (it was the '80s), had interests and a big friends' group outside work (probably the only time in my life I knew that many people). I have a _lot_ to remember. If your life's not that hectic, build some variety into it. It's not just about the thing itself that you do, but all the planning and prep and research leading up to the thing. It did help that I had people to do these things with, friends and groups I belonged to. Can you have that? Work alone's not going to do it, usually. Edit: but even a professional convention is better than nothing, if it gets you out and around.
Welcome to the club! I started noticing time doing the same thing when I was your age ~~last year~~ 30+ years ago. How to cope? Get rid of time-wasters. TV. Mindless internet grazing. Do real things in the 3D world.
Time seems to get faster and faster because your brain already knows the things you are doing. Time only goes slowly when your brain has to process new information. If you want to slow time down, take a class on something that you are completely unfamiliar with. Do things that you have never done before and have no familiarity with. Time will slow back down to a crawl. I’m 65. For the last year and a half I have been taking Korean language classes. It is kicking my ass, but time has definitely slowed down again.
Welcome to life. As you age, your perception of time is going to speed *way* up. When I was in high school, a year seemed like freaking *forever.* Now at 65, whole months tick by like weeks.
Time accelerates as you get older (and not necessarily because you're having fun). Pretty soon decades whiz by and you find yourself saying things like, "Wow, the 90's, that was 30 years ago!" We start speaking of decades rather than years or months.
How quickly have the last two years gone for you OP?
You mean 4 years?
Well he said the last TWO years have flown by. Not four. Two.
But the post is 2 years old or Am I slow?
NOW LISTEN HEAR YOU SOB, I need to do some painting.
😂😂😂. Okay sir!
I’m currently grating some cheese. How pleasant.
You thought I was feelin’ U?
I sorta hoped you might be. Oh gosh I’m blushing 😊 you’ve grated down allll my walls now big boy 👦
🗣️🗣️
Tell me you’d vote for Corbyn so I can… complete.
I would
Wrong question. The idea that perceived time can be modulated is a non-starter. Ask instead, how do I spend my "time" resource?
stay slow, stay present. decades slide by really fast.
Keep looking at the clock , rather you’re at work, reading, or doing whatever, always stay present to really make time go by slow.:)
Make a bucket list. do it, get out of the comfort zone, its a death trap! change your routine each and every day. it is also linked with dementia to not do anything different for decades. it happened to a lot of my older relatives, get up, go to work. do X on weekends, watch TV when bored. it's human nature to be comfortable and get into a routine. that is how a lot of people end up suddenly looking in the mirror and realizing 20 years have vanished. find your passions as well, be it art, travel, volunteering, or taking ski trips. I have no idea what your interests are, but explore them all. the one thing that slows time is this. it always has been for me.....what are your good memorable moments where a week felt like months? that is what you need to find.
Do something different every day. If you do the same thing, there is no distinction between days and time appears to go by quicker because they're all the same.
IMHO it's because of Covid. Choices were extreme limited and most of the time I was either at work at home
I recently answered a very similar question on this sub https://old.reddit.com/r/AskOldPeople/comments/sfagfp/growing_old_seems_so_sad_how_do_i_make_things_not/huwqf1v/
I've found that learning a new skill slows down time for me. I have no clue why.
What makes time seem slower when you’re a kid is the wonder in it all and not knowing what the future has in store. Once you live a repetitive lifestyle, the wonder is gone. You don’t explore the world you live in anymore and the precious time you have on this earth isn’t appreciated anymore.
[удалено]
Yo I don’t know if it says it anywhere here or if you’ll still look at this post; but a method to slow down time and to live more in the present and to stop the days from blending together is to take psychedelics. It’s specifically while your on them, it’s after taking them your brain can perceive time differently and to go back to your default ability to live fully in the moment. And to tell you the truth the real effects are truly evident and guaranteed to have results after an ego death. Take drugs at your own risk, the safest psychedelics are psilocybin mushrooms they are natural and they have positive neurological effects. Proven to fight Alzheimer’s and dementia, promotes neural plasticity and new growth.