| Old Time New Time
When people are young we call them children. Children think time drags
by slowly, every day lasts a lifetime, every moment is almost tangible
in its slow passage. Keep a child waiting in a queue and they get bored
so quickly.
As we get older time seems to accelerate. Time flies by. This is because
our perception of time slows down.
When brains are young and fresh they collect information very rapidly,
the internal clock ticks at a high rate.
Our perception of the world does not happen at a fixed rate.
Time 'feels' like its going faster and slower, depending on how important
the sensation of our environment is.
Think of a film camera. It takes 24 pictures in a second. If it takes
40 pictures in a second and then those pictures are played back at the
normal speed of 24 pictures a second then the pictures seem to move
slower. Take fewer pictures per second, say 15, and play back all the
pictures at 24 pictures per second and the pictures seem to speed up.
As we get older our brains take fewer and fewer 'pictures' every second.
This is not because of the effect of aging, but because on the relevance
we perceive our surroundings to have.
We are only aware of what has happened in our memory, where the 'pictures'
are being played back at the regular rate. So as we get older and the
internal camera seems to get slower and time appears to speed up.
This is a common phenomenon felt by all aging people.
The Temporal Soup
Some drugs affect a person's perception of time, because they affect
the mechanism of the internal 'camera' - that collection of energy receptors
and their interpretation by the brain. I would not recommend chaotic
alteration of the brain's time perception. Rather, one can influence
the naturally occurring drugs in the brain to alter time. Stir the Temporal
Soup.
How to Slow Down Time
Ever been in an accident and it felt like time was slowing down? This
is because your internal camera went into adrenaline overdrive and took
more pictures per second than normal.
The human brain is a self-balancing system. Too much adrenaline and
the brain balances out, making your average thoughts and pictures much
slower. You can use this in the opposite.
To counter the time-aperture effect and to feel like the days aren't
rushing by you need to relax your brain. When your brain is completely
relaxed and healthy it starts to take pictures at a higher rate, and
becomes more focused. You can practice time dilation by focusing on
something mundane.
Traditionally some monks spent hours focusing on a candle flame without
thinking a single thought. This re-trains the mind to process quickly,
subconsciously, to take in a lot of information, because the information
is perceived to be rare and valuable. When you rely on your slow consciousness
your perception becomes slow too. What is reflex but a faster processing
of information by the subconscious? When you see everything around you
as being rare and valuable your mind speeds up and your perception of
time slows down. You use your subconscious more, the faster internal
processor.
Everything that exists is important, give it your full and focused attention.
When you focus your attention on a being, the tiny nuances of that person
become valuable to you.
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