3. A Simple Measure of Life: Time

Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of.Benjamin Franklin

If time is the stuff life is made of, what is time itself made of? 

As children we were trained to believe that time is composed of a linear set of markers, ticking forward into the future, tocking back into the past. This, however, is a lie, and it matters. Time, as we actually experience it, is anything but linear. Through the distortions of cognition, time speeds by or freezes, is made or filled, wasted or killed.

If we accept that “experiential time” – i.e. time as processed through our brains - is not chronological and linear, then we can begin to imagine that it might be possible to influence or manipulate the experience of time in ways that are beneficial and accretive. If you accept this, then you can accept that it might be possible to experience more life through the lens of time and hence really live longer without adding a single chronological day.

“Are you killing time or making time?”

There exists, in fact, an alternate paradigm of time with a set of rules that we all experience but for some reason continue to ignore in favor of the linear view of chronological time. After more than 10 years of studying and thinking about time, I have uncovered some elegantly simple insights about the nature of what time is actually composed of.  In the coming weeks I will share what I have discovered about the New Physics of Time and its application to how we experience life.  You may end up wondering, as I did, why we ever accepted an alternate notion of time in the first place.

Three Laws of Temporal Dynamics govern experiential time.: 

First Law: Temporal Contraction Second Law: Temporal Inversion Third Law: Temporal Expansion

These laws can each be documented with: a)  a relatable story that demonstrates how the law plays out in reality, b) a metaphor describing the system dynamics, and c) suggested mechanisms to manipulate time in beneficial, accretive or expansive ways.

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The First Law of Temporal Dynamics: The Law of Contraction

All other factors being held constant, the conduit for the flow of time, as processed through the constraints of cognition, will contract, resulting in the subsequent perception of the acceleration of time.

Coming Soon: In post 4. I will explain the first law in detail.

(T-15118)