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Why time seems to pass faster as we age

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Re: Why time seems to pass faster as we age

#161

Post by navane »

Madmallard wrote: post #147
larve wrote: post #118

One thing I love about the speedup of time is that picking a compounding habit (say, doing something for 10 minutes each day) feels like having an almost instant pay-off. "Oh wow 3 years already passed" -> "Oh wow I got pretty good at this thing I picked up just yesterday" I picked up biking during the pandemic, and 3 years later I have legs of steel, 10k miles under my belt, and people know me as "the bike guy", whe…

It kinda sucks that you learn much slower when you’re older though. I’ve been practicing piano an hour or two a day for 7 months and I don’t really feel like I’ve improved at all. I was intermediate when I started and I am taking professional lessons. Mid 30s here.

You might need a teacher. Biking is all endurance, piano involves a bit more.

Re: Why time seems to pass faster as we age

#162

Post by crossroadsguy »

boredemployee wrote: post #156
Madmallard wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It kinda sucks that you learn much slower when you’re older though. I’ve been practicing piano an hour or two a day for 7 months and I don’t really feel like I’ve improved at all. I was intermediate when I started and I am taking professional lessons. Mid 30s here.

learning curve of the piano is crazy. and if you stop playing you go back to zero really really fast

What instruments are relatively easier to play?

Re: Why time seems to pass faster as we age

#163

Post by QuercusMax »

boredemployee wrote: post #156
Madmallard wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It kinda sucks that you learn much slower when you’re older though. I’ve been practicing piano an hour or two a day for 7 months and I don’t really feel like I’ve improved at all. I was intermediate when I started and I am taking professional lessons. Mid 30s here.

learning curve of the piano is crazy. and if you stop playing you go back to zero really really fast

That's very much not been my experience. I learned to play when I was in grade school, took most of a decade off during college and early 20s, then picked it back up.

I also had an enforced multi-year hiatus when I broke my arm at age 35.

I might need to do some extra drills and practice to get back to where I had been, but the fundamentals never left. Like riding a bike - might be out of shape, but I still know how everything works.

Re: Why time seems to pass faster as we age

#164

Post by marktucker »

crossroadsguy wrote: post #162
boredemployee wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

learning curve of the piano is crazy. and if you stop playing you go back to zero really really fast

What instruments are relatively easier to play?

I could recommend taiko (Japanese) drums as an adult hobby. You very quickly get off the ground in terms of making wonderful music together with a group.

Re: Why time seems to pass faster as we age

#167

Post by hosh »

In my early and mid 30s, as a result of visionary experiences, my experience of "lived time" changed. In general, moments lasts a lot longer.

This doesn't really have to do with the brain becoming a better prediction machine so much as how mindful and present you are in the moment. While it is true that doing the same things over and over creates habits (ruts) of the mind, the practice of mindfulness reverses this.

These days (in my early 40s), when I spar with swords, time stretches out by a lot. Especially during tournaments.

Re: Why time seems to pass faster as we age

#168

Post by awb »

nerder92 wrote: post #159

One very simple explanation I’ve read is that time perception (as time itself) is relative. Time goes slower when you are a child because your perception of time is relative to the totality of time you’ve experienced. So for instance, when you go from 1 to 2yrs old, it’s double the amount of your entire life, but from 80 to 81 it’s just a small fraction. Not sure if this has been proven or is even possible to prove.

That makes sense to me.

Also, if you think about memory recall, it takes a second to recall a memory.

So you have the ability to traverse time at a rate of (Your Current Age - Age of Your Earliest Memory) / 1 second

So maybe it’s also the feeling that looking back in time feels faster (more time has elapsed relative to the speed of memory recall) as you get older.

Re: Why time seems to pass faster as we age

#169

Post by hosh »

Madmallard wrote: post #147
larve wrote: post #118

One thing I love about the speedup of time is that picking a compounding habit (say, doing something for 10 minutes each day) feels like having an almost instant pay-off. "Oh wow 3 years already passed" -> "Oh wow I got pretty good at this thing I picked up just yesterday" I picked up biking during the pandemic, and 3 years later I have legs of steel, 10k miles under my belt, and people know me as "the bike guy", whe…

It kinda sucks that you learn much slower when you’re older though. I’ve been practicing piano an hour or two a day for 7 months and I don’t really feel like I’ve improved at all. I was intermediate when I started and I am taking professional lessons. Mid 30s here.

I don't pick things up nearly as fast now (early 40s) as I was when I was younger (pre-tten, teen, 20s, and 30s). However, I also pick things up in a very different way that in some ways, are more effective than when I was young.

For example, it takes me longer to gain the intuition of something, but on the other hand, when I do, it plugs into a vaster web of knowledge. I am certainly more disciplined in both mind and body compared to when I was younger. I'm capable of clearer visualization and simulations now than before. I've got a lot more math under my belt.

I learned piano as a kid, picked it up pretty fast, and forgot a lot of it. I am not practiced in sight reading any more. On the other hand, when I poked around learning again, it's tapping much deeper into music theory, composition. For example, I learned Petzold's Minute in G Major (formerly attributed to Bach) as a kid and as an adult. I still can't quite get both hands working together as an adult ... but I was cracking up as I kept seeing how beautiful the chords are composed together in a way I never noticed as a kid.

Re: Why time seems to pass faster as we age

#170

Post by LorenDB »

nerder92 wrote: post #159

One very simple explanation I’ve read is that time perception (as time itself) is relative. Time goes slower when you are a child because your perception of time is relative to the totality of time you’ve experienced. So for instance, when you go from 1 to 2yrs old, it’s double the amount of your entire life, but from 80 to 81 it’s just a small fraction. Not sure if this has been proven or is even possible to prove.

I also tend to view it this way.
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