Aging Capriciously

This won’t take long! How often has someone said that to you or you have said that to someone else? A few years ago, I bought my first gas grill. I had never owned one and Karen and I decided it was time. To save a few bucks, I ordered it through the Internet. When it came, it was in one huge box which I had a hard time moving into the garage by myself. I vaguely remember something about it only taking fifteen minutes to put together. Well, it took me 30 minutes just to lay all of the parts out. Three hours and forty five minutes later, I had finished putting my grill together. Except for putting the batteries in backwards, I was able to fire the thing right up and do my first outside grilling at the age of 60. I was thrilled except when I thought how long it took me to put it together. I was even angrier the next day when after going to Home Depot, I found the same grill assembled. I could have purchased it there pre-assembled; with delivery and it would have only cost me 25 dollars more. Thus, my savings did not even come close to paying for my time, not to mention my aggravation.

We often underestimate the length of time it will take to do things. Sometimes we are misled by advertisements but often by our own misconceptions. The thought “this won’t take long” should be a red flag for most of us. On reflection, the phrase is seldom true. They say anything worthwhile takes time. We can do the worthless fast, but those things that are really meaningful and valuable will take more time.

What things and events do you most often underestimate? What jobs or tasks do you rush through? What work do you have to do today that you should allow more time for? What areas in your life should you spend more time on? It is a lot easier to be less frustrated and to do a better job when you can allow the right amount of time needed for the job and not worry about it “taking too long.”

Age gnaws at life
Without respite –
Incessantly; insidiously;
Unnerving in its non–rhythmicity:
Irregular pendulums–
Not on clocks–
Dump cold milestones:
Another wrinkle; another grey hair;
Another memory…Mark R. Slaughter, (From his poem Memories)

Have you ever noticed how time can change your memories? Sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse! The old house that you were brought up in seemed so much bigger in your memory. The places that you visited seemed so far away. The people that you knew, some seemed kinder and some meaner. Time has a way of making things both greater and lesser than they really were.

Time also has a way of etching things in our memory that may never have been. Have you ever thought you were at some event or place and you can’t really remember how or when you got there? A friend of ours thought she had attended some such event and her husband insisted that she had not. They finally concluded that she might have seen some pictures of the event, known some people there and “projected” herself into the event. Her memories of being there were crystal clear, but she had never really been there. I can think of many places and events that I thought I was at but then realized I was “projecting” images and events from a book or article I had read. Over time, my mind imagined that I was part of the event. The event or place had now become part of my memory of places that I had seen or been to.

Sometimes time can change memories for the worse. People remember a negative event in their lives, perhaps someone hurt them or insulted them, and this event or person can grow in their minds until it engulfs them in anger or pity. It might have been a slight in some bygone role or some unintended rebuff from someone you cared about or whom you thought really cared about you. Or it might have been much more serious. Perhaps, it was a mother leaving an abusive relationship behind or perhaps it was a child running away from an abusive home. Over time, the negativity associated with the circumstances may grow until the only memories are filled with either anger or sadness. Our memories tend to paint things as black or white and we are often unable to see the shades of gray that really existed. People become all good or all bad.

Today I am going to wonder about the events and people in my life. Were they really what I remember them as being? Were they really that good or that bad? What if my memories are not actual projections of reality but fantasies based on hopes and desires in my mind and dreams? Do I want to change any of my memories? Do I have the power or desire to do so? What if I just let sleeping dogs lie? Is that the best solution?

I lost track of the time. Where did the time go? How often have you heard someone make this comment? Generally, it means we were so engrossed with what we were doing that we forgot we had another appointment or schedule. When we lose track of time, time no longer seems to exist. It is not moving fast or slow, it just does not seem to matter to us. I heard someone say recently that they did not wake up and say “gee, I have to go to work today.” Instead, they woke up and said “Wow, I get to go to work again today.” Can you imagine the difference between time for the first case and time for the second? Time in the first case is drudgery and time in the second is a joy.

When you do not enjoy what you are doing, time is the most oppressive. You check the clock. You wonder when the time will go by. You find ways to “break” up your time. The more “breaks” the better. When you enjoy or even love what you are doing, you forget the clock. You don’t worry about breaks or when it is time to go home. Sean John’s says “life without passion is unforgiveable.” He lives this in his daily life. His message is important for all of us. How many of us find lives that are full of passion? Why not? Is such a life beyond our reaches or do we just fail to make the choice?

The more our world is dominated by time, by pressures to do things faster, to multi-task, or to live in the fast lane, the less happy and more stressed we will be. Wouldn’t it be wonderful, if time did not matter anymore and we could lose track of time on a permanent basis? What if our lives were so filled with passion that every second was one we could live with for eternity? What if we counted Passion instead of minutes?

When was the last time you lost track of time? Can you hardly wait to go to work today or do you count each workday between Sunday and Friday? Is your life filled with passion or wondering when the minute hand will move forward? Are you in the “Thank God it’s Friday” camp or in the “I am looking forward to Monday” camp.

Time clocks are synonymous with the industrial revolution. Prior to industrial work, people thought of time as more cyclical. Time clocks went hand in hand with factory or machine and assembly line work. The concept of a “Time clock” is an oxymoron. Aren’t all clocks, time clocks? The industrial revolution was a period when brawn became more valued than brains. It was more important to measure the amount of time that a person worked (and this was equated with productivity and quantity) then the quality or creativity of their work. The information age and knowledge age has reportedly ushered in a quantum change in how we view and value work. Today, creativity and innovation have become highly prized, at least in word if not in deed.

On hears today that quality, creativity and innovation are the cornerstones of success in the 21st century business world. Nevertheless, we still see managers who are more concerned with the time clock as a measure of productivity than anything else.
How long did you work today is often more important than how much you accomplished or what new ideas and innovations you could come up with. We talk about allowing workers to telecommute, yet many managers express the view that: “how will I know what they are doing or if they are really working?” “Well, perhaps they will not get their job done and then you would know!” We may live in the knowledge age, but the industrial era mindset is still dominant in many workplaces.

It often takes a generation before minds catch up with new technology and paradigm shifts. We have 21st century needs and technology still driven by 20th century minds and concerns. Companies that cannot make the change are destined to go the way of the dinosaur. The same might be said for managers who cannot change their mindset.

What do you value in your workplace? Do you measure how much your employees contribute, including ideas and innovations or are you measuring how long they work and how many hours they put in? Do you have the power to change things? If so, when will you go from the 20th century to the 21st? When will you start treating your employees like knowledge workers rather than machines?

We often hear the comment from someone getting older that they are “Aging like fine wine.” Well, yes, wine does gets better with age, but sadly, the human body does not. My joints and muscles are no longer as flexible as they once were. My body does not recover as fast from aches and pains as it once did, and I no longer dream of playing football on the weekends or any rough contact sports for that matter. My body seems to be aging more like cheese. It is getting softer and moldier around the edges. It might still be edible but it is not as fresh as it once was. The good side of this issue is that my brain is more nimble and astute than ever. The body will inevitably deteriorate, (even with plastic surgery), but the brain does not necessarily age the same way. Studies have shown that IQ can remain the same throughout one’s life, if you keep “exercising” the brain by reading, studying and learning. Now of course, the body will stay in better shape as well if you keep up with some exercising. However, no amount of exercising is going to keep the body in the same shape as when we were 21 or younger.

Then we come to the soul and spirit. Here is where age can really excel over youth. Through experience and moral exercise, we can all become better then we were. We can continue to grow spiritually and morally throughout our entire lives. We can leave this earth as better people. We can give back to the world some of what we took from it. However, this also requires exercise. It requires exercise of both moral and spiritual values. It requires moral and spiritual discipline. You will not grow in either area if you do not take the time to practice skills that lead to moral and spiritual development. The virtues of faith, hope, charity and love must be practiced daily or they atrophy like old moldy cheese.

What exercise do you get each day? Do you exercise morally and spiritually as well as physically and mentally? Which areas do you need to concentrate more on? Are you aging like a fine wine or like moldy cheese? What do you need to do to perk up your aging process?

Balancing time is one of the biggest juggling acts facing most of us. Considering how well we do, we should all think of ourselves as “jugglers of time.” We schedule this meeting, then that meeting and still another meeting and in between meetings, we must do paperwork, find time for lunch, get some errands done, meet with our boss and then get more paperwork done. We return home and then must balance time for ourselves, our spouses, our children, our family, our friends and also more errands, housework and chores that demand time.

I sometimes think that someone could make a fortune starting a time service for people. I would show up at your house and do all the minor things that take up so much time and don’t really add value to your life. Of course, if you have money, you may already be paying people to do the housekeeping, the yard, the chores etc. You are then juggling a variety of services that help to “save” you time. Many of us cannot afford these services and must juggle lives, jobs, chores etc, ourselves. As society has become more modern, we seem to be juggling more and more. Perhaps this is because we are not run by “natural” clocks anymore and in a sense (unlike milking cows or farm chores), the time we have is really discretionary. This puts more power in our hands to manage time but also demands more of our balancing skills.

What do you need to balance today? Are you balancing the unimportant things and forgetting to include the really important things in your life? Is your present balancing act bringing you happiness and satisfaction or is your balance out of kilter?

Stop wasting my time! This is a comment that is frequently heard and seldom reflected on. What does it mean to waste someone’s time? Does the person know they are wasting your time? What was the person doing that “wasted” your time? Is it like wasting food or wasting money? When someone tells you something that you are not interested in, does it waste your time? In a country where the average person watches more than 25 hours a week of TV, it seems preposterous that anyone could dare use a phrase like “stop wasting my time.”

We spend four hours per week watching people hitting a ball, carrying a ball, throwing a ball and bouncing a ball in games that we call sports, but we do not consider this a “waste” of our time. If sports and TV are not time wasters, then what qualifies? What wastes your time? Is this time when you are not doing anything? Whose fault is that if you have nothing to do? If we were honest, we would admit that most of us waste our own time with silly meaningless activities designed to take our mind off living and perhaps really accomplishing something. We are each experts at ways to waste time. TV, gambling, casinos, watching sports, newspapers, endless meetings, etc. are only a smattering of the myriad ways we waste our time each day.

Wasting time may be a very subjective term, since what I think is very wasteful, you might think is very useful. My ideas of what constitute a valuable use of time might fit your definition of “time wasters.” Nevertheless, we all have our own ideas of what time wasting means to us.

What if more of us started “wasting” our time on the activities that could really make a difference to the world? What would the world be like, if more of us took an interest in government, law and politics and less in TV, gambling, sports and other such time wasters? What if we spent more time in charitable activities, loving others, finding ways to bring peace to the world, building bridges and creating friendships with those in need? What if we spent 25 hours a week on creative activities instead of watching TV? Could you spend one hour less on TV this week and one hour more on peace? Where would you start? When will you start? Why not today?

You have one year to live! What if your doctor told you today that you had only one year to live? It’s not a pleasant thing to think about, but it might be true right now. Who among us can know the day of our death? We all know people who were healthy and active and died unexpectedly. We also know people who smoked, drank and never exercised and died rather less expectedly. Nevertheless, none of us know the exact day we will die. My sister was a smoker and like my father she was diagnosed with cancer. They predicted she would die within six months and she lived nearly four years longer. Neither my father nor sister had a very active or healthy life. Neither of them lived to their expected old age. My father was sixty when he died and my sister was fifty four. They both had ample warning to get their lives in order but both did little or nothing about it.

Perhaps too many of us live with no thought of dying because we “assume” we have a great deal more time to live. Maybe we are young and think we will live forever or maybe we regularly work out and think this will prolong our life. By assuming we will live longer, we put up with a lot of stuff that we would be better off dealing with. We stay in dead end jobs, we ignore things we really want to do, or we put off living until we are retired.

Are you waiting to live your life? If you died today, would you have any regrets? If you thought about the possibility that this proposition was true (that you only had one year to live), would you do anything different? Do you think you would try to get your life in better order? What do you need to do to make this next year the best year of your life?

Losing track of time! You thought it was 4 PM and it was now 7PM! Where did the time go? We have all had the experience of losing track of time. What causes us to lost track of time? I think for many of us, when we are so focused on what we are doing, time seems to simply fly by. It goes a hundred miles an hour when we are focused and disciplined. Time flies and we do not even notice. The minutes or even hours that we lost seem to have been compressed into a few seconds. Paradoxically, those times lost are some of the most memorable times in our lives.

The first time we met someone we fell in love with, our first day on a new job, a trip to a special place, a meeting with someone extraordinarily interesting; in each of these instances, time either flew by or we did not even notice the clock passing. We became so engaged that time no longer existed. And who can forget those times? The fact that we lost track of time is unimportant. What remains important to us is the experience of being so absorbed and so immersed in what we were doing or who we were with that time no longer mattered to us. We lose track of time because we stop caring about time and its passage. The present becomes more important than the past or the future. We are truly living in the present in these moments and time no longer counts.

When was the last time you lost track of time? What were you doing? How often do you lose track of time? Do you ever regret losing track of time? What if you lost track of time more often? What would your life be like if you were more absorbed in the present and less conscious of the past and future?

Losing time is an expression that one hears as “I lost a great deal of time waiting for him to show up.” In actual practice, this concept of losing time may either be an oxymoron or perhaps simply an outright impossibility. I suppose that you could argue that since we “find time”, perhaps someone has lost it somewhere. However, can you actually lose time? Have you ever lost time? I would like to know how one could lose something that exists only in our heads.

You might have used more time than you thought you would, but you never lost time. Even if you waited four hours for someone to show up whom never did, you did not lose time. You might not have got much done and you might have better used your time elsewhere but you did not lose anything; unless, it was faith in the person you were waiting for. Perhaps we are really talking about “misusing time, but that would be different than losing time.

If you misuse your body by smoking, excessive indulgences, lack of exercise, lack of sleep or too much stress, you will undoubtedly “lose” time, in the sense that you will live a much shorter life. Nevertheless, there are always those lucky few who will still outlive many of us regardless of how well we use our time. But for most of us, if we abuse our health and our time we can count on a shorter life. Thus, losing time is not like a watch that runs slower, it is more like taking time out of your bucket of time and throwing it away. The problem is you might never find it again. Once it is gone, it is gone forever.

Using your time properly, you will never lose it and it is never too late to start. Make a commitment to start exercising today or to stop smoking or to practice a better diet and you are making a commitment to finding time. These practices will help you to find the time that you lost by using your time properly. The correct use of time is the only way to really find time and the incorrect use of time is the only way to lose time. Use time to do the things that really add years to your life and you will be happier and live longer. What do you need to do today to start finding your “lost” time?