“How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.” ~Annie Dillard
Time. It is arguably our most valuable commodity.
Unlike treasured gems, precious metals, and any other prized possessions, time can’t be hoarded, collected, earned, or bought with hard work, money, dignity, or our soul. It slips away whether or not we choose to pack meaning into it. Use it or lose it, so goes the saying.
Though we all know how limited our lives are in the time-space continuum, we sometimes act like we don’t know the value of time. We use words like spend, kill, or waste when we speak of how we while away the finite number of hours in each day.
Time management systems abound and still, we flounder and falter at making the most of every sunrise. We plan for the future and neglect to cherish the present. We’d rather look back wistfully even though the future is full of hope.
And yet, for many of us, it seems there are not enough hours in a day. We cram all that goes with living into twenty-four hours of ticking, bargaining with Father Time, naively expecting him to budge to our willful and resolute intentions to produce more, accomplish more, be more.
We paddle in paradox, limbs flailing, trading in the quality of our lives while doggedly pursuing an idealized quality of life.
Time. Like all the treasures in the world, we can’t take it with us when we reach our final stop. Some among us may never be willing to embrace happiness in and with the time that we do have.
For the rest of us, here are ways to improve our relationship with time. (Some things may appear to be contradictory. This is a testament to the complex nature of our relationship with time.) (more…)
