How we perceive time: stop it slipping away by doing new things
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How we perceive time: stop it slipping away by doing new things
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Re: How we perceive time: stop it slipping away by doing new things
#2This is also a similar thesis to what Joshua Foer writes about in Moonwalking with Einstein. One key takeaway is that whenever you're in a new environment, or doing something new, take time to appreciate your present surroundings, not worrying about the past or future. This way you can help extend the sense of time as well.
Re: How we perceive time: stop it slipping away by doing new things
#3I think I've read this somewhere. In fact, I'm sure I have. However, I completely agree with the author as this is something that I've experienced myself.
Re: How we perceive time: stop it slipping away by doing new things
#4There's some solid advice in the article.
However, childhood summers don't seem long primarily because you're doing new things, but rather because of relative perception of time. When you're two years old, one summer spans 1/8 of your life. Unless you live in the UK.
Re: How we perceive time: stop it slipping away by doing new things
#5I first came across this idea in this NPR article: http://www.npr.org/blogs/13.7/2010/09/29/130221453/how-to-li...
I haven't been very successful in applying the suggestions. I tend to repeat the same few activities (building software, bike riding, spending time with the 10 or so people closest to me) because I really enjoy those things. I'm not convinced that having time pass quickly is at odds with feeling content with one's life.
Re: How we perceive time: stop it slipping away by doing new things
#6You ever go away from work for a few weeks, and when you come back people say "huh, you're back already", but it's been a month?
When everything is the same week-in week-out, we don't seem to record it the same. From a sanity point of view this may be a good thing...
Re: How we perceive time: stop it slipping away by doing new things
#7I wonder if this is the reason why during psychedelic trips time seems to last much longer. The vast amount of completely new information causes the brain to slow time down.
Re: How we perceive time: stop it slipping away by doing new things
#8For the most part this all made sense to me, but it also seemed to contradict experiences I've had. For example, whenever I have work days that consist of the same type of meaningless coding it seems to drag on forever, but give me an interesting or complex (or new) problem that I can really sink my teeth into and the day goes by in a flash.
Also, National Geographic's show Brain Games did an episode about our perception of time. It had a lot of this info in it; it even showed the experiment of displaying familiar pictures with the occasional unfamiliar picture mixed in. http://braingames.nationalgeographic.com/episode/2/
Re: How we perceive time: stop it slipping away by doing new things
#9You ever go away from work for a few weeks, and when you come back people say "huh, you're back already", but it's been a month? When everything is the same week-in week-out, we don't seem to record it the same. From a sanity point of view this may be a good thing...
In the past year I've lived and worked on 3 continents, done a long road trip, now settled in a new city and established a home there, had a few different jobs, met many new people and had a window into some very different worlds. This is very different from pervious years of mine, as I lived in the city I was born in for my entire life.
It's the only year I haven't looked back and thought, "Wow, it's been a year, already?" I actually look back and think about just how much I've done in a year. The passage of time still stings in a way that it always will, but I've figured out that the key to avoiding pure regret is having a host of varying experiences to look back upon.
Re: How we perceive time: stop it slipping away by doing new things
#10I think the article generally makes intuitive sense. The only thing I'd say though is that thing about 'new' stuff. If I'm really concentrating on something new, 4 or 5 hours can go by, and it felt like it went by really quickly.