The tricky ticks of time
Something I've noticed the last few weeks is the malleability of time and how easily it changes with my headspace. It almost feels magical.
For as long as I'm panicking about how little time I have, I'll only ever have little time. But I've found that days that I let myself gaze out the window and let myself take as long as I need, I suddenly have all this time in my pocket. Time passes by me slower.
One of the loudest voices in my head I hear is, "I'm running out of time." But it's bigger than just running out of time to finish my day's to-do list. Imagine having a professor say to you in class, "You've got this huge, ginormous thing that's worth 99% of your grade due really soon," and she never says when. That's what it feels like.
When it comes to me stopping and asking myself what it is that I feel like I'm running out of time for exactly, I never know. I don't know if the "huge, ginormous thing" is an exam, a quiz, an assignment, an essay-- it could be anything! I don't know what I need to equip myself with, what I need to know already, or what it is that I'm preparing myself for. It becomes a guessing game with myself of trying to figure out what the important thing is.
When it comes down to it, my closest guess is that I feel like I'm running out of time to be successful. I believe my friends, the same age as me, are very skilled and high-achieving, and this makes me feel like I'm lagging behind in my 'success'. I've put a lot of emphasis on my age for about the last ten birthdays, always thinking about where I should already be and what I should have already achieved compared to everyone else my age. I don't give enough time to looking back to where I've come from and what I've done before now. I also don't often look at my present. Usually, I look at the uncertainty of my future and the un-guaranteed success of my efforts.
I have to remind myself that I still have my whole life ahead of me. I have to remind myself that I have a life beyond my student life; I have a working life and a social life that I need to tend to as well. If I try to distribute my time perfectly to achieve maximum efficiency in all my lives, then I miss the forest for the trees. I get so bogged down by my passing time that I don't see where time has led me to already.
And, in the wise words of a certain favourite turtle...
"Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift. That is why it's called a present."Master Oogway, Kung Fu Panda (2008)