I have recently noticed a strange contradiction in my perception of time. As I get older, I am more aware that my future time is getting shorter. I have completed the great majority of the years I will have. This makes me want to be more deliberate about what I do with the remaining time. Who do I want to spend time with? Where do I want to go? What will be the legacy that I leave? I have many answers for these questions, but generally, thinking about the time I have left leaves me with a sense of scarcity.
In contrast, now that I have been retired for several years, and my husband recently passed away, I no longer have extensive work or caregiving responsibilities. I feel that I have more time in the present, in each new day. And although I am busy most days, filled with activities like household chores, meeting family or friends, reading, going to the gym, writing for my Blog, etc., I have a sense of luxury in time, probably because on most days I have choices about what I will do.
Of course the two time frames overlap, and my current days are filling my remaining years. And yet, I sense a difference, in that the time I have now, my todays, are the only time I have any control over.
And there is another change in my time perception that is happening: time sems to be going by more quickly. When I recently went on vacation, although I was away for six days, in retrospect it seemed even shorter. Where did the time go? It’s a little scary. I want to say – hey, wait a minute – or a few – I didn’t want that time to go so quickly. But will that be how I feel from now on? When I am enjoying myself time seems to go by faster, but those are the very times I don’t want to experience as fleeting.
Some researchers and popular media articles have noted that time seems to go faster when you get older because you have fewer new experiences to mark the passing time. They recommend that doing new activities and experiences will make it feel that time does not move so fast. But this doesn’t usually apply to me; often it is when I am engaged in new experiences, and enjoying myself—be it with new people, trips, restaurants, etc., —that time seems to go the fastest. Perhaps my time perception differs according to where I am in the experience- whether I am actually in it as compared to when I am recalling the experience.
But if the remedy for me to slow down time is to engage in activities that are boring, I certainly don’t want that. I think the only solution is to plan and engage in each day and simply experience it, making choices when I can, and enjoying the expanse of time I feel I have within that day. Even planning for things I want to do, like travel, writing a book, or getting a special gift for someone I love, can bring joy. This is another part of an experience, its anticipation, and I can choose what I want to anticipate. As for the future, it may be diminishing in time, but I have little control over that. In any case, I will only be able to experience it day by day.
Reflections on Aging 