Do You Ever Feel Like Time Is Marching On Without You?

[Lliam]

It's not like it marches on without me, but it does slip by. It's kind of like when you are engrossed in something like an art project, or reading or writing something, and when you look at the clock you find that hours have passed when it seemed like minutes. Was it a waste of time?

Think of the alternative, though. A minute can seem like an hour when you are counting the seconds. Like waiting for the last half hour to pass before you get off work. Think how long two minutes seem to take when you are waiting for something to load on your computer.

When you are busy and time goes by quickly, it's a good thing except for the fact that when time flies you also get physically older. Also, when time flies by because you are busy, you can look back at the cool stuff you did. All those minutes become memories.

What's funny is, you are unaware that time is passing. What makes you aware of it are reminders like birthdays, anniversaries and kids growing up. Other than that, you feel how you always did.

Sure, looking in the mirror at times can confront you with the reality of age. You begin to notice differences in the way your body performs, too. And you can think back to reflect on how stupid you were 50, 25, 10 or 2 years ago.

All that stuff sneaks up on you.

I can see that I'm looking at the question from my own perspective, though. I've done some really cool stuff and had a lot of fun. I can see that even during periods when life seemed to kind of suck, I had amazing and valuable experiences.

But I can see how just living from day to day without any joy, waiting for life to begin would be be like life (or rather "time") marching by without you. It's a mistake to postpone living in order to wait for a perfect circumstance. "I'm waiting for the perfect partner." "I'm waiting for the perfect job." "I'm waiting." "I'm waiting."
Instead of waiting, it's better to go out and have experiences. Even my crappiest jobs taught me lessons. The same is true of relationships that were less than ideal. Jobs, relationships, and every other thing I went out and did made me better equipped for the next opportunity.
It is better to live life to the fullest and grasp opportunities that present themselves. Carpe dium.

I'll close with a quote from Hunter Thompson. “Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!”

[Massageman]

Executive summary- I surely DO!
Until God decides to banish "time", it will move on- methodically and unceasingly- with OR without me. Time seems to move more quickly with each passing year.

Details-
This story appears to fit with most people's experience. Most of us feel that time moved very slowly when we were children and is gradually speeding up as we grow older. We've all remarked on it: how Christmas seems to come around quicker every year, how you're just getting used to writing the date of the new year on your cheques and you realise that it's almost over, how your children are about to finish school when it doesn't seem long since you were changing their diapers..

Questionnaires by psychologists have shown that almost everyone — including college students — feels that time is passing more quickly (at their current age) compared to when they were half or a quarter as old. And perhaps most strikingly, a number of experiments have shown that, when older people are asked to guess how long intervals of time are, or to ‘reproduce' the length of periods of time, they guess a shorter amount than younger people.

We usually become conscious of this speeding up around our late twenties, when many of us have settled down. We have steady jobs, marriages, and homes, and our lives become ordered into routines; the daily routine of working, coming home, having dinner and watching TV; the weekly routine of perhaps going to the gym on Monday night, out for a pizza on Wednesday night, and going for a drink with friends on Friday night; and the yearly routine of birthdays, bank holidays and two week vacation in the summer. After a few years, we start to realize that the time it takes us to run through these routines seems to be decreasing, as if we're on a phonograph picking up speed with every rotation.

Psychologists call this forward telescoping : our tendency to think that past events have happened more recently than they actually have. Marriages, deaths, births of a child — when we look back at these and other significant events, we're often surprised that they happened so long ago, shocked to find that it's already been six or seven years since a friend died when we thought it was only a couple of years, or that a niece or nephew is already ten years old when it only seems like three or four years since they were born.

So why do we experience this speeding up of time? Is this a Star Trek trick?
A popular answer is the proportional theory, which suggests that the important factor is that, as you get older, each time period constitutes a smaller and smaller fraction of your life as a whole.

This theory is usually attributed to Paul Janet, who, in 1877, suggested that, "the apparent length of an interval at a given epoch of a man's life is proportional to the total length of the life itself. A child of 10 feels a year as 1/10 of his whole life — a man of 50 as 1/50 of HIS whole life meanwhile apparently preserving a constant length."

So, during the time it took me to write this, about 30 minutes have marched forward, never to be seen again. BTW- Have a good day!

[CrazyGirl2]

Yeah, but isn’t that what time does? I remember a riddle I heard years ago:
I build mountains, and tear them down again.
i turn the deserts to oceans, then back to deserts.
Ican cover the planet in ice, or make it a tropical paradise
I build kingdoms, and watch them whither
I’ve seen every book to ever be written, and I’ll watch as they all become dust.
what am I? The answer… TIME!

[Paolaa988]

Hell yeah!! I’m so done with rushing. I rushed as a kid and as a teen and it came before my own vary eyes and I’m 22 now turning 23 this year and now I just wanna enjoy every moment and not rush time because it’s marching by as we know. I told my friend I’m gonna cry when I turn 23 this fall and she’s like wait till you turn 30, she’s 31.

[razelove]

Plenty of times, because that's the truth. New kids are born every day, other ones get older, and we get more obsolete. This is reality. If you aren't making something new, you're falling behind. Granted most kids today are of the variety that will stay at home until they're 22 or so before getting their first job.

My folks would have kicked my ass if I had taken that attitude lol

[Inexpensivefurniture]

Yes. I'm disabled and can't work or live on my own. I often can't even focus on my hobbies because I'm in pain. I see all my friends getting their own places, getting jobs, going to school, dating, planning for the future... and I'm just trying to get through each day. Time is passing quickly and even though I'm doing my best, I feel like I'm wasting it

[Jjpayne]

I totally do... I feel like a 20 year old, trapped in an almost 40 year body and I'm asking how I'm getting grey hairs before I even know what life looks like 😳 you take time for granted early on in life and it comes back to bite you

[PaynefulPleasures]

Some days I feel time goes by so slowly, then other days way to fast,& then days like this I feel time is on my time ✌️https://youtu.be/JforKK52WIw

[menina]

Yes sometimes I do. I'm not where I should be and I'm not who I should be, so I definitely feel that time is being unfair to me and I'm being left behind.

[The_Maphio]

Heh, time doesn't spare anybody. You either follow it or are left behind.
In any case, there's no escaping its effects. It's one cruel master.

[cheapshotbob]

https://www.youtube.com/embed/JwYX52BP2Skthis song is what time feels like to me, and its relevant too your question

[CosmicPule]

Yes. Many times since I'm unsuccessful in owing a girl in my life though she loved me. I wish time runs back to take me and what I have lost! Feel like I'm stuck alone when a lot much younger are are committed, married and got kids who are going to school now!

[exitseven]

With the pandemic I feel like I lost a whole year of my life so yes it is marching on without me.
I am slowing getting it back under control. I have made some changes in my life and I think that there are still lots of good things in store for me.

[CharlyQuinn_]

Recently is seems like that. My oldest is starting school this summer and it doesn't seem that long ago she was born.

[Jean-Marie_Céline]

Good question, thank you for asking it!
To be honest, sometimes yes. I have to keep up with time, and sometimes I just can't.

[ohshee]

Time Is TIME

That has

NO TIME




But it is sure moving faster and faster

The older I get the faster time flys

[ChiTown33]

I used to. Then i got off the hamster wheel and started living my life according to my own rules.
But be prepared for the judgement that that comes with. Lol

[Coulis]

Well it is so I just try to make sure I don't let myself pass me by amd trybto do doing something beneficial at all times. Actively or passively.

I will say that these seem like the words of someone who is feeling a bit down/depressed.

[Account]

Constantly. Sometimes I feel like I lack the perception of it.

[Jaximus-Lion]

Oh yes! The greatest enemy that no one knows about.

[jennifer_bloom]

I never considered marriage and kids when I planned my life and now I’m in my 30s with no kids and some people think I’m too late, I want a good looking guy but not sure how easy that will be because I haven’t fulfilled my career goals yet.

[dubbled1970]

Yeah when you have a bad job makes time March on cause you don’t wanna be there day in and day out so feels like you are wishing time away.

[Wiredone]

I am so busy that it seems like time flys by me. Sometimes I get my days mixed up and I'm like "where did the days go"? There just isn't enough hours in a day for me.

[GoodGuyBreakingBad]

Yes, I feel this way often, and makes me wonder about things?