Where has the time gone?

When I reactivated my blog, I told myself I have to write a new post at least once a week and consistently post it every Thursday so that my fans have time to read during the weekend and hopefully as time goes by, will look out to reading my blog every weekend. And so I did for the past 3 blogs. But this week, the time seems to fly by and I missed my Thursday posting.

And thus, I asked myself, ‘Where has time gone?’

When I started to think of this phrase, I recalled that most of my friends think the same. And these phrases seems to repeat itself whenever we meet:
• Where has the time gone?
• Times seems to fly!
• Don’t you think time seems to pass by faster these days?
• Is it because we are older that time passes so fast?
• I don’t seem to have enough time!

Or gosh,
• It’s September already!
• It’s 4th quarter of the year soon!
• Christmas is coming round the corner again!
• Chinese New Year is just 5 months away!

Then I thought of my younger days. Time seems to pass so very slowly. I remember how I waited for school holiday to start. And how when school holiday comes, each day seems to pass so slowly although I am having great time with my friends. Then we waited for so long for Chinese New Year, eagerly looking forward to wearing new dress, eating the once a year cookies and receiving ang pows from our parents, grandparents, aunties and uncles.

So how is it so that time seems to fly faster now that we are older?

I think it’s because of these 4 reasons:

(1) Counting the days when we were younger
Don’t you all agree that we count down the days when we were younger? We were more focused on time, on days of the week. We count the days to the test, count the days to the school break, and count the days to the school excursions that we are going to.

(2) Less attention to time when we are older
But now as we age, we are more focused on our family life, our friends, our activities, our chores, our duties, our holiday plans…the lists are endless. As a result we don’t notice the passage of time. We work on our list of chores continuously that by noon or by end day, we’ll look at the time and ask, “Gosh, where has the time gone? It’s lunchtime already!”

(3) Anticipating something slows down the time
Yes, when we anticipate good things, e.g. a holiday, the time seems to pass slower. Again, it’s because we start counting the days!

(4) Too much to do causes stress and speeds up time
I totally agreed to this. When there’s a list of tasks to do within a given timeline, I always felt stress. Stress because I started worrying that I don’t have enough time to do it. As a result I felt that time seems to pass so fast as I keep thinking I still have so much to do and I don’t have enough time.

So in concluding, it’s not that time is passing faster now that we are older. But it’s just that now that we are older, we have more responsibilities, we have extended families, and we have more friends...which means more activities. Thus always feeling that there’s just not enough time to complete our chores, our responsibilities, not to mention catching up with our families, relatives, school mates, colleagues, friends, etc.

Whilst these feelings are inescapable, we should just go with the flow. Take time to slow down in the midst of our chores. Take time to be aware of what you are really doing at that precise moment instead of rushing through. Pause to look closely at the trees, at the leaves, at the flowers. When you are with your family, relations, friends, etc. take time to be with them, to enjoy their company.

So rest assured that the next time you look at the clock, the time that you sees is just working fine, and it’s the same time, be it when you were younger or older!

DO YOU ALL NOT AGREE?

THANK YOU to 'Sweet Kisses & Dirty Dishes' and 'Calvin & Hobbes' for the images.