About Time, Session 2: The Fear of Missing Out

"This space that has been granted to us rushes by so speedily and so swiftly that all save a very few find life at an end just when they are getting ready to live.”

Like Seneca and the other philosophers we have been studying, Oliver Burkeman provides the long-but-short way to personal change. It is a long way because it involves becoming more aware of our mindset about time, who we think we are, and our attempts to secure our self-concept. With growing awareness, we find the courage to question what we observe about our mindsets. This is a lifetime process. Yet, it is the short way because, as Burkeman points out, the time management techniques we try out one after the other are almost always futile.

Right at the start, Burkeman turns to Seneca: “This space that has been granted to us rushes by so speedily and so swiftly that all save a very few find life at an end just when they are getting ready to live.”

And if you haven’t gotten the message, Burkeman adds, “On almost any meaningful timescale, as the contemporary philosopher Thomas Nagel has written, ‘we will all be dead any minute.’”

Houston, we have a problem! Yet, the solution is not to paddle faster or attempt the impossible. Thankfully, the solution—the long-but-short way—is to subtract our faulty mindsets.

As we read, every erroneous mindset Burkeman points out seems so relevant. Imagine a time-themed game of bingo. We’d all fill pretty much the same squares.