Time Only Moves Forward
Time moves at one speed. What changes is who you become while spending it.
Our Time is Finite
Time is never slower or faster. Time never stalls or moves backward. Time always moves forward at the same speed.
Meanwhile, you keep getting older, spending more of your time on Earth. And by spending more time on Earth, you have less time left to spend on it. As long as that time is finite, it is a zero-sum game: the more you spend, the less you have.
Now that I am 31, it has taken me a fair amount of that time to realize something. I don’t have infinite time here — but I don’t have very little, either. It feels almost like a sweet spot in how I perceive time. I’m not that young, nor that old. I wonder how the view will change as I keep getting older.
Grounded, Calm, and Fearless
One feeling I have now that I didn’t have before is being grounded. Through the years, and all the trial and error, I have shaped a set of judgments and mental models I now see things through. It shows up in concrete ways:
I understand better what kind of game I am playing.
I’m fairly sure which things simply won’t work on me.
I no longer fear disappointing people — if that is what is meant to be.
I have more courage for the difficult conversation, in both my work and my private relationships.
In short, I understand myself more.
When I was younger, I was fearless too, but in a different way: questioning everything, breaking conformity. It was fearlessness on the rebellious side. Now it is on the calm side.
It is not about being fearless enough to yell at each other in an argument. It is about being calm enough to say, “I don’t like it,” in a difficult conversation I chose to start.
I used to be fearless about breaking rules and building new things. Now I am fearless about those things coming undone — projects destroyed or stolen, people betraying me or leaving.
I am very calm, and also very fearless at the same time.
Without spending significant time, I would not have reached this state. I really appreciate the time, and the lesson of time.
I still have ambition, love, positivity, calmness, fearlessness, and hope — all of it in me. But my mind is no longer occupied by worry or fear about sudden turnover, at work or among the people around me. It is simply part of my life now, radiated from a tall, steady pillar I call my sense of self.