I was away on a mini holiday in the mountains for a week in British Columbia (B.C) and my bestie of over 30 years joined me on the last weekend. There’s something about being out in nature, having that downtime from working that allows for reflection and clarity on life. I always find it’s a great opportunity to check in and see what’s working and what’s not. As we reminisced about the good ole days and some of the experiences and fun times we had over the years, our conversation at one point turned to time and how as we get older, it seems to slip by quicker than when we were in our twenties enjoying life. The other part about time that both of us felt, was it had us in it’s grips and we somehow were living our life around it.
We discussed how we weren’t as flexible as we once were with time and how it seems to consume us. The 2 days on the weekend that we get off in a week to enjoy that work/life balance, has become less enjoyable as we have these structural routines such as on Saturday’s we go get groceries so that on Sunday we meal prep, and do laundry for the upcoming work week. We aren’t enjoying the weekends as we should be instead, we are ensuring we have the future work week all sorted out and it doesn’t feel like we are actually doing anything else but being a slave to these routines.
We left the cabin and the beautiful mountains early Sunday morning – several hours before we needed to, and both rushed home to ensure we had all of our meals prepped, house cleaned and laundry completed for the start of the work week – I got home at 11:30am, unpacked and completed my chores, it was early afternoon and there I was in my house relaxing in front of the TV when I could have been enjoying the mountains, or laying on the beach at the lake I just left, or hiking or kayaking and I was suddenly very disappointed in myself that I gave up living for the moment and taking advantage of the 5 or 6 extra daylight hours I could have been enjoying myself as I only get out to B.C. once or twice a year. I headed home early to make sure I didn’t have to fight the traffic on the 3 hour drive home and ensuring I had the upcoming week sorted out. What would have been so terrible if I got home at 5:00p.m? I could have still thrown in a load of laundry and made a meal to get by for Monday but I felt the anxiety of leaving later would have been too much. It was as if I stole 5 hours away from what could have been amazing, cherished memories doing what I know I love. I sometimes feel like there are competing needs going on with me – one where I want to be doing the things I love and enjoy and then this need for comfort and safety and all the routines revolving around that feeling to avoid the anxiety that creeps in.
I catch myself doing this often, having alot of structure and multiple routines, and I find myself rushing home after work to get to the grocery store to ensure I’m not waiting in line, I just want to get in and get out and get home. What has happened to me? Why do I feel I need to rush around? I might even enjoy the drive if I took my time, and lived more carefree, listened to the music in the vehicle and then meandered the aisles in the store, smiling at people, maybe making someone’s day. Nope, instead I’m stressing myself out by rushing around sometimes getting angry at how slow people are driving and all for what? – To be safely and comfortably at home at a certain time (5:00pm) so I can finish supper and have my lunch packed by 6:30pm and hang out until I go to bed at 10:00pm. It’s crazy when I think about it. I feel I would have a lot less tension in my life if I didn’t put myself through all that. While structure and routines can be a good thing on one hand to have consistency and get things done, there needs to be some sort of balance and flexibility built into a day as well. I remember a few years ago when I lived downtown, just a 15 minute walk from work and I would stroll home very casually. I would see people rushing to catch the train to go home and they wanted to get on the one they could see arriving from across the street even though a train comes every 6 minutes, they were practically killing themselves to run across the road in front of traffic to grab that one. And then I would see people driving madly out of the downtown to get to the suburbs and I remember thinking wow, that use to be me and I was grateful to not be that person anymore. Then I moved back up in the suburbs 2 years ago, I find myself doing it again. Is it a coincidence or is something else going on? As I get older, the more rigid and anxious I feel I become about so many things. I really have to catch myself when I become aware of it and this is just one example for me.
I remember back to my dad being this way. The older he got, he too had his routines. When he was in his 70’s he was still getting up at 5:00am to ensure he got his 2 cups of coffee in by himself in the kitchen before my mom got up. In that few hours of alone time, he would make sure all the bills were looked after, all the paperwork organized and any appointments or notes he needed to put down to remind himself were done in that time. All of this could be done in a one morning and then he had 6 other ones where he just sat in the dim lit kitchen contemplating life. I remember back then that the more time he had on his own like that, it seemed the more time he had to his own thoughts, to think and worry about stuff. There’s a bible verse about idle thoughts being the devils playground which seemed very fitting for my dad. When I lived out of town and the kids and I would come and stay for a weekend visit, it was always after the morning when I got up that he chose to have the conversations with me about…”are you sure you have enough money to be doing this or that? Is your vehicle’s maintenance up to date? Is everything okay at work? Is your marriage going okay?” And on and on the grilling would go. It was always the “worry” questions that parents have about their kids but it seemed to come after he had the time to be in his head in the morning when it was quiet and he was alone. My mom, siblings and I use to get frustrated with him and it was a running joke we all had about how rigid dad had become later in life. Now I think I have become my father!
I wondered if this has more to do with control and feeling safe you know that human need of certainty than maybe it does with time. If there’s one thing I have learned this past year, it’s that I need to feel certain in who I am in order to have that sense of confidence to live the life I want. So what is making me feel that uncomfortableness of being uncertain or unsure of myself right now? Tony Robbins teaches that there are 6 human needs: 1.Certainty – the desire to feel safe and secure 2.Uncertainty – the desire for change, novelty and exploration 3.Significance – the desire to feel recognized, important, and/or meaningful 4.Love and Connection – the desire to feel and express love and or closeness 5.Growth – the desire to grow or expand in any area of your life and 6.Contribution – the desire to give or serve
I’m not going to get into them in detail here as they deserve an article all on their own down the road. However, this need for certainty is all about time and comfort and it feels like that one is driving the bus on this – feeling like you have to spend time to organize your week far in advance instead of enjoying the moments. We all have some desire for certainty and comfort. This can be anything from comfort food, a couch at home, or anything that makes us feel safe. But why is it so hard to just stop and smell the roses as well for some of us and not others? Why am I tied to the clock when it feels like I could be enjoying so much more life?
I got curious about all these questions that were coming up for me and dug a bit into what the experts say about how the brain works with structure/routines and time and also if there could be something pointing to getting older and time seeming to fly by…?
Steve Taylor a Senior Lecturer in Psychology, Leeds Beckett University wrote a book called Making Time. In the book, he suggests a number of basic laws of psychological time, as experienced by most people. “One of these is that time seems to speed up as we get older. Another is that time seems to slow down when we’re exposed to new environments and experiences.” He goes on to explain that these two laws are caused by the same underlying factor: the relationship between our experience of time and the amount of information (including perceptions, sensations and thoughts) our minds process. The more information our minds take in, the slower time seems to pass. This partly explains why time passes so slowly for children and seems to speed up as we get older. For children, the world is a fascinating place, full of new experiences and fresh sensations. As we get older, we have fewer new experiences and the world around us becomes more and more familiar. We become desensitized to our experience, which means that we process less information, and time seems to speed up. (Another factor may be the proportional aspect, which is that as we get older each period of time constitutes a smaller proportion of our life as a whole.) It follows, then, that our experience of time should expand in unfamiliar surroundings, because this is where our minds process more information than normal. When you go away to a foreign country you are much more sensitive to your surroundings. Everything is unfamiliar and new, so you pay much more attention and take in much more information. It’s the same when you spend a day on a training course, learning new things with a group of unfamiliar people. It feels like more time has passed than would have done if you had stayed at home following your normal routine.”
Taylor goes on to talk about all of this leading to two simple suggestions about how we can expand our experience of time. “Firstly, since we know that familiarity makes time pass faster, we can slow down time by exposing ourselves to as much new experience as possible. By travelling to new places, giving ourselves new challenges, meeting new people, exposing our minds to new information, hobbies and skills, and so on. This will increase the amount of information our minds process and stretch out our experience of time passing. Secondly, and perhaps most effectively, we can slow down time by making a conscious effort to be more mindful of our experiences. Mindfulness means giving our whole attention to an experience – to what we are seeing, feeling, tasting, smelling or hearing – rather than to our thoughts.”
All of this makes sense as I notice that at certain moments when I am really present like when I’m out in nature and taking everything in through my senses – hearing the birds, smelling the pine from the trees and viewing the beauty of my surroundings, I am experiencing through my senses rather than through my mind, it’s a different attitude to my experience. Or when I’m in the shower and not letting my mind wander but feeling the water wash my body and listening to how it sounds it’s when I am caught up in that moment that I truly appreciate what I am experiencing and when I do this, it’s as if time stands still. Taylor suggests avoiding the familiarity and it doesn’t have to be by seeking new experiences but changing our attitude to our experiences. He also mentions, “When you do chores such as mowing the lawn or washing the dishes, don’t listen to music on your headphones or let yourself daydream. Give your attention to the objects and phenomena around you and the physical sensations you are experiencing. One thing you’ll find is that these chores become more enjoyable. And you’ll also discover that this open and alert attitude to your experiences has a time-expanding effect, since mindfulness increases the amount of information we process. From this point of view, we don’t have to think of time as an enemy. To a certain extent, we can understand and control our experience of time passing. Many of us try to make sure we can live for as long as possible by eating good food and exercising, which is sensible. But it’s possible for us to increase the amount of time that we experience in our lives in another way – by expanding our experience of time.”
Rachel Schnalzer wrote an article for the LA times back in May 2020 talking about how time flew by for some and not others during the pandemic. She theorizes that this is because for some, they were stuck home most of the time and only had short trips outside for exercise or a quick visit to the grocery store and we weren’t taking part in any memorable activities like socializing, going to sporting events or travelling. She mentions the work of Marc Wittmann, an author and research fellow at the institute of Frontier Areas of Psychology and Mental Health in Freiburg Germany. He says that, “if you’re doing the same thing every day — the new normal for many in quarantine — there’s no need to remember each day specifically. Even if time passes slowly in the moment, it’s likely that nothing will stand out upon looking back, causing you to perceive time has passed by quickly in the long run.” He goes on to explain, “The more emotional a memory, the longer perception of time duration.” This is why a weekend vacation will often feel longer than a weekend spent at home. And right now, many in quarantine are experiencing the opposite of a vacation”
Adrian Bejan, a professor of mechanical engineering and materials science at Duke University reiterates this idea of how time could have been so different for each person. He believes it’s possible the novelty of the quarantine experience could actually explain why weeks may feel like they’re dragging to some. He says, “The brain remembers the unusual, and if our new routines are suddenly different, our brains would be bombarded with images worth remembering. This would then result in the perception that time is moving slowly over the quarantine experience, though it’s likely time will feel as though it’s speeding up again as the quarantine becomes more familiar. It’s also important to note not everyone has the relative luxury of feeling bored at home while in quarantine. Many people are busier than ever, whether they’re working in a hospital on the front lines of the coronavirus or at home balancing a full work schedule while home schooling children. It’s possible people who are busier than ever during the coronavirus crisis will look back and feel as though this period of their lives lasted longer than normal.”
Basically, if time is flying by it could be because you aren’t really doing anything exciting in your life, not stepping out but staying home. It has everything to do with the emotions that come with experiencing. Wow that makes total sense to me! If we go out and enjoy ourselves and get back out into the world, this slows time down. It would seem the older we get the less we tend to go out, it’s that safety of being at home that we get comfortable in and that’s why it seems like time is flying by the older we get. When I read this, I felt like I had just uncovered a secret to a longer life! This was backed up by James Broadway, an instructor of psychology at Lincoln Land Community College in Illinois, who has studied the brain’s perception of time, and he notes a similar phenomenon occurs when we age. The older we get, the fewer novel events we experience, which causes time to feel as if it’s going by faster than it did earlier in our lives. He points out that a similar phenomenon can happen to people who are sick or incarcerated. Time will pass slowly as it’s experienced but then feel as if it’s gone by quickly in retrospect.
You maybe asking what does all of this have to do with meeting needs? Well by keeping ourselves “safe” with our rituals and routines, we are in fact robbing ourselves of time. As mentioned, time slows down when we go out and have meaningful experiences where we can attach emotions to them. If we spend all day home ensuring our certainty need is met to feel safe with structure, then we aren’t having those experiences. We all have a need for certainty and this is a good thing, it’s just that when we aren’t filling that need ourselves in a positive way that it is then being done for us on autopilot in a negative way. Here are some of the certainty needs that can take place in the moment: Choice, Autonomy, Independence, space/boundaries, Safety, Structure/routine, Order, Stability, Support, Food, Movement/exercise, Rest/sleep, Trust, Peace. So how do you fix this feeling of uncertainty and properly meet the certainty need?
With all of this on top of my mind, I decided to take a 6 hour online course this week to get to the bottom of this and find tools to help work around it so I am living life to the fullest. I’ve mentioned in previous articles, the courses I have done with the Personal Development School created by Thais Gibson, well that’s where I went to see what she had and I found some great insight in her course Discover, Embrace and Fulfill Your Personal Needs. In this course I learned that with the need for certainty to feel safe and secure, the brain goes out of it’s way to reinforce these patterns to keep us safe but we can build strategies to compensate for this and ease the old dinasour part of the brain that is constantly working to feel safe. This is a summary of what I learned about this need and hopefully you gain some insight for yourself if you are also struggling with this as well.
If you look at the need of certainty as a bucket and it has to be filled, and if there’s a hole in the bucket, then we overcompensate to fill it and it’s usually in the negative. For example, if there’s a hole in our certainty need, we will do what I did last weekend and give up the opportunity to spend more time in the mountains to rush home and ensure all my chores are done. If there’s a hole in this bucket, we can never have enough certainty in our life. we will have more planning, more checklists, more checking of things in our house, more checking if the door is locked, if the stove is turned off or if you remembered to turn the curling iron off when you leave the house in the morning for work. We become more rigid and create more structure in our lives and are more intense in our relationship to time. Even though you may get more and more of it, you never solve the problem. Our association to time becomes compulsive. None of this is going to be solved until we figure out what that hole in our bucket is. We need to reflect inward and find out where the gap exists within us. This spiral feeling of being out of control just never ends. So where are these subconscious hidden places where we actively sabotage our ability to meet these needs reside? And where to do we find the holes in our bucket? For certainty, it quite often can be catastrophizing and cognitive distortion. On the extreme side of this, no matter how certain our lives feel we drive to work thinking what if I get into an accident or what if something happens on my way to visit someone or what if something happens to our children when we aren’t with them, what if, what if, what it. Always looking at the probability of something happening around the corner. Constantly telling stories to ourselves that we aren’t safe, I’m powerless, and what could go wrong. Another reason this can be showing up is in the realm of boundaries. We aren’t setting some where we should be. For example, if at work someone is stepping on one of our boundaries and we don’t speak up for ourselves, our boundaries are being violated or someone is taking advantage of us. When we aren’t supporting ourselves by standing up and telling that person how we really feel, then it can create this sort of feeling that our hands are being tied all the time and we feel powerless or helpless. We then look for other not so positive ways to get that sense of support and sense of feeling safe by implementing these rigid structural routines where we can control them. This can usually be in our own home unless that is where the violation is happening with another member of the household but for this example, I’m using the work place. By not having boundaries in our lives with certain situations, and it maybe happening with more than one person even possibly with ourselves as well or we have values being violated by doing something that we know isn’t right, this will show up in our behaviour. I found out it’s a good thing to recognize that you are being too rigid, it’s a wake up call to go, “I need to check in and see what’s going on”. Everything happens for a reason, these triggers, are there to highlight it’s time to see where we need to improve and in this case set boundaries. Setting boundaries is a healthy way to communicate in relationships. Although, setting boundaries is not always easy if we aren’t familiar with doing that or for standing up for ourselves. It’s when we learn to respect ourselves, by setting boundaries, that this then shows up in our external world and we get that respect from others. It all starts with ourselves and having regular check ins and doing the internal growth work, that we show up for ourselves!
Other things that create uncertainty is a lack of awareness of ourselves, our needs, our purpose of what we want – our own identity, lack of intentions in our lives for our future, knowing who we are, what we desire, where we want to go, can also create this sense of uncertainty. Also, by self abandoning when we get into a relationship with someone else. We can sometimes throw away our own values or needs to support the other person or people please to be in that relationship. If this happens one time, not a big deal but if this is how you live your life with interactions on a regular basis it robs you from your sense of certainty and will create a disempowering way of feeling and lead to long term resentment in our relationships. Putting other people’s needs before our own, not validating our own feelings or putting ourselves on hold for another person or conflict in the working place, giving more than we able to our employer (no work/life balance), this is what creates these holes.
So, if you know where your hole is, now what? We have to start with creating strategies for the holes before we pour into our bucket. For catastrophizing we need to start making space for ourselves to tackle the cognitive distortions. Living in a place of fear, will only attract negative energy for some of what we fear to come true. When we practice integrating not living in that state of worse case scenario projections all the time, we can put ourselves at ease. To do this, set time aside in the evening or morning to journal out what if this were to happen or that and then create strategies for them. Then list out 3 reasons you know you will be able to handle this and overcome this challenge. Even though most of these fears may seem far fetched, these are stories that have been running in the background due to the negative input you may have picked up from the news or other negative people in your life. They are now being reinforced by your own thoughts and by doing it in a journal, you put your mind at ease and then it doesn’t take up energy or your time through out the day. And then eventually you feel equipped to handle anything and these fears will subside and go away. The important thing is to make time for them otherwise you will not address this issue.
Create strategies by feeling in a state of control. Think about where you have a sense of control in what you are doing externally. For example, you are in a situation where this is happening at work but you need the job and you have to accept the situation – look where you can control things. Start by boundaries – can we control how we communicate our boundaries to this person or the amount of time we are around this person? Removing ourselves from their presence where possible until you can gain confidence from doing some internal work will help. You can always control how you think about this person. Start thinking about the positives in your workplace. We can control how we perceive, think and choose to allow ourselves what we take away from the situation. Controlling our internal dialogue overall, controlling the amount of work we are doing on ourselves, controlling how we state boundaries and how we choose to set them. When looking at certainty overall and doing the work on having boundaries, the more boundaries you have the more comfortable you feel and the more you trust yourself to assert yourself in the world and the safer you will feel in your world!
You will feel more comfortable being able to solve your problems on your own and will feel empowered and the more comfortable you get solving your problems, the more you will trust yourself. When something goes wrong, you can go okay, I can handle this. When you can look at the situation, solve for it, do the emotional work for it to self regulate, and then take steps to do what you need to in order to take care of it. As we build that self trust and capacity to handle life that way, life begins to feel easier. Certainty comes from learning to trust yourself to rely on yourself. Do the emotional work around it and take steps to start setting boundaries in a smaller area with people you trust maybe family or friends and gain that muscle for setting boundaries so that you feel stronger to set with the person you have conflict with. Facing these uncomfortable situations is how we build trust with ourselves. By actively solving problems that are creating emotional distress in your life – getting to the root, emotions are feedback, go inwards, check with your stories you tell yourself and correcting them to what is real, what needs do we have and then strategize to solve what can be done to meet that need. This is how we fill the bucket. Surround yourself with safe friends and relationships and support systems. Set goals and create a direction for your life and a have a plan that you can execute and see that you are making forward motion in your life. Being more adaptable when opportunity arises maybe with accepting more invites to socialize and practice getting outside that comfort zone and have more connection in your life if that’s lacking. Make a list of what you need and ensure you communicate that within your relationships and continue to set those boundaries as required. Have financial goals and set up a budget that allows you to meet these goals. Look at your career and assess if there’s room to set goals to meet a certainty need there. Look at all 7 areas of life and create a routine to meet these needs regularly that allows you to live in the positive of this certainty need we all have and then this will free up time in the day to enjoy it!
I’ve summarized a lot here with regards to how time works and also how feeling uncertain can deprive us of precious time. I hope you get the gist of possibilities with what I’ve shared. I really found clarity in this and know that my struggle to set boundaries and be assertive could be causing uncertainty for me and how I am disrespecting myself when I don’t follow through with setting them. Respect has always been something I wanted from others but lately realize I need to respect myself first in order to have that in the external world. I have done a lot of work up to this point, however, I realize there is so much more to do. I am grateful for the conversation that took place with my friend as it brought this to light for me so I could look into what it meant and how to improve myself. I look forward to delving into this more in each of the areas of my life to uncover where I can build trust and respect with myself, to plug up those holes and begin filling that bucket of certainty. I will continue to expand my experiences as well and not get caught up in the mundane cycle of groundhog day when I give in to the same old thing, get up go to work come home and be on autopilot. That is such an easy rut to get into and stay in unfortunately. I went for a walk earlier to the wooded green space in my neighbourhood and after a few minutes, I took out my ear buds and just listened to the sounds of the light breeze affecting the quiet noise of the leaves blowing, the birds chirping loudly, I felt the sun on my face and really embraced the beautiful surroundings of flowers and shrubs along the path. I did experience time standing still in those moments. Then my thoughts drifted off to other things and I had to keep pulling myself back to the present moment and each time I did, it brought a smile to my face and I was filled with great sensation of emotions. Lao Tzu says, “If you are depressed, you are living in the past. If you are anxious you are living in the future. If you are at peace, you are living in the moment.” Obviously, it’s ongoing work to resolve what I need to do to fill the holes in my bucket and add more value to my life by being adaptable and living in the moment. Time doesn’t have to fly by, I can expand it. I need to slow down, stop rushing around and really enjoy my experiences. I believe like beauty, time is in the eye of the beholder – it’s up to me to take control of my time and feel the essence of what it can really offer me and embrace it instead of being a slave to it. John F. Kennedy put it best, “We must use time as a tool, and not as a couch.”