'Holiday paradox' explains Why Time Flies as we age

I think almost all of us have noticed this effect. As a small child a week felt like an eternity. Now as adults, the months and years fly past.

This article explains how to slow it back down a little.

Learning to manipulate our perception of time could make our lives feel fuller and reassure those who feel that the years slip by faster as they grow older.

Ms Hammond said when we are doing something new and interesting – such as when we are on holiday – time appears to go more quickly than when we are bored or anxious.

But when we look back retrospectively, our assessment of time is based on how many individual new memories we built up during that period, she explained.

In a normal fortnight the average person only accumulates between six and nine new memories because so much of what we do is routine.

But on a holiday we can build up that number of memories in a single day because everything we experience is new, meaning that when we look back it will seem to have lasted much longer than it really did.

But when we look back retrospectively, our assessment of time is based on how many individual new memories we built up during that period, she explained.

"Taking a different route to work, getting off your bus a stop early or avoiding having the same sandwich for lunch every day could make life seem a little slower," she said.

The Telegraph

So in other words, its the fact that we are not doing anything new that means we are not laying down new memories makes the passage of time seem faster when we look back.

I have noticed this effect when on holiday if I drive and stay in a new place every night or when I have moved to a new country and the first 3 months felt like a year.

Routine is the danger. It makes the years fly by. Do something new and time will slow down again - at least looking back.

Very true!

1 week feels like 3 or 4 days to me. And I've got to say, I have a pretty harsh routine with the way I'm living at the moment. Although, I'm working on changing it.

Routines being the cause of the time-feels -like-it-goes-faster also explains why having kids makes the effect feel even worse. Taking care of kids is nothing but routine some days. When I see a messy room my child caused I see a run of the mill chore I do everyday but to my kid it was an imaginative adventure, different than yesterdays or the day before that.

Here's a good question...If 'new and exciting' slows the perception of time then why does 'time fly when your having fun'?

ive always wondered what causes this. i figured it was the fact that we are expanding with the universe. how the mind works eludes me.

Originally posted by PutAQuarterIn
Here's a good question...If 'new and exciting' slows the perception of time then why does 'time fly when your having fun'?

That's a good question.

The article itself says that time does fly by when we are having fun but that our perception of the passing of time feels slower when we look back.

Simply because we have new memories to remember.

"When you sit with a nice girl for two hours, it seems like two minutes. When you sit on a hot stove for two minutes, it seems like two hours that's relativity." -- Albert Einstein

reply to post by ollncasino


I'm going to say that it is the brain's way of slowing down because all that thinking requires a great deal of energy, more than any other bodily process. Next is digestion if I remember right, so it also makes sense that people lose muscle mass so that they won't need as much energy.

Also, death has a way of "recycling" things, and so once you've reached a certain age (and have been presumed by 'death' to have passed on your genes, which I believe is maybe our only purpose on this earth), "life" will turn on you and death creeps in for the kill. A "You've done your part, now get out of the way of the new generation."

Nothing really lasts forever, right? Things go from one state to another, but even black holes emit energy. Don't black holes start out as stars (light emitting) then "turn dark" (black holes). I could be way off here, but it seems to me that whatever is once bright or alive or young (all variations of the same type of thing) will eventually go dark or as G. Lucas put it, "turn to the dark side." It's a metaphor for reality. Our bodies literally rot and eventually would turn into oil.

I might be willing to say that our solar star Sun is a god, and so are each of certain planets. Ancient people thought so. Saturn's color is represented by black. Black is associated with death. Life comes from the light and ends up in the dark after its light has burned out. What is depicted in the art of our Sun / son / "jesus" -- a fire in the center around the heart. Fire in the center. The fiery sun in the center.

Really gone off on a tangent here...

s&f

so, what about time flies when ur havin fun?

DUDE. crazy you say that.
remember that movie?(because I don't) maybe it was click?
where the guy fast forwards through all of the boring routine stuff and only stops during fun stuff? and then it breaks or something, and he can ONLY relive/live the parts of his life that were not normal routine (different new experience for him)

idk. something like that. still 4/20n'.
but I know that there was a movie about something like that xD

When you are 4 years old , a year is a quarter of your life .
When you are 40 years old , a year is 1/40 of your life and your perception of time will increase accordingly.

Just my take on things .

DP

reply to post by ollncasino


Yeah, I posted a thread earlier where I mentioned the fact that the older I get, the faster time seems to go by.

Certainly seems to make sense and therefore definitely worth a try. Conversely, could we also use repetition to hopefully cause bad experiences and events in our lives pass more swiftly?

I suffer from a severely debilitating depression to the extent that I have had to argue not be categorized as "handicapped" or "disabled" by the doctors who at least help me maintain a semblance of sanity through it all. I want more than anything to be productive and make a difference, and I want to thank the OP for giving me something to look forward to trying.

Best wishes to all.

I thought it was just me but it seems its always friday to me. Not a bad thing for some but i quit all of my partying and drinking so its really no different from sunday. Im in my 30s and within the last 2 years it seems that time has really picked up its pace. I have lots of things planned in life and it scares me how fast the weeks are flying by i dont want to miss out while i have the chance, maybe it is just because of age like someone posted. Last friday i found out that my woman was pregnant it will be the first baby for both of us im so excited, maybe raising a newborn baby will slow things down for me i hope so. Star for getting the gears in my head turning this late at night.

Maybe its because when we are having fun, we are "in the moment" more and so our memory is disconnected and thus we can't remember as much later. But if we try to "remember the moment" while we are having fun, that is sort of a buzz kill. Hey everyone stop having fun for a moment so we can all remember the moment. Awwww pfffft! Booo...

I guess that works both ways. Painful moments produce far more memories and greater trauma associated with them. So maybe if we have less fun, we'll have a longer life and more vivid memories? Awww pffft! Boooo...

Just stay in the moment and pay attention, you'll live longer that way.

reply to post by ollncasino


You can cause time dilation (and contraction) with hypnosis, that is shape a subject's perception of the passage of time.

Hypnosis @ Wikibooks

Interesting article.. and while I think there could be some truth to it, I don't think it's the whole of it. When a child turns 3, 1/3 of it's life and memories are 1 year. Next year when I turn 30, 1/3 of my life will be 10 years. As I grow older.. time will grow faster because the measured period will be a smaller fraction of the total.

Originally posted by dawnprince
When you are 4 years old , a year is a quarter of your life .
When you are 40 years old , a year is 1/40 of your life and your perception of time will increase accordingly.

Just my take on things .

DP

Sounds pretty clever. To 'nip pick,' ...instead of life, it would make sense to say "current amount of time having lived" since we have no idea how long your life will be. (I don't anyway...) This may be just a very riddle-ish type of saying, but it is interesting to ponder.

Did you think of it yourself?

I see someone else made a similar comment. I admit to skipping the article and making my comments directly without having the article to form a response.

reply to post by daynight42


I guess you were refering to me when you said someone made a similar comment.. though I did read the article. My response was based on my opinion of time seeming to speed up.. and not directed at the article itself, simply because I don't feel it is a direct experience of my own.