Do you find the speed of life sometimes breath-taking? Technology is developing so fast most of us cannot keep up with it. You might feel that each new gadget and discovery, intended to make our lives easier, nibbles away at your day. Ask yourself, 'How fast is too fast for me?'

The world we have constructed for ourselves evolves at such record speeds that we can barely picture it even twenty years from now. Just watch the video 'Did You Know' that Sony created in 2008 for its employees. The predictions are truly mind-boggling. If the world will indeed change so dramatically, what are you and will you be doing to maintain your balance?

Time is an illusive concept, a structure intended to help us make sense of our lives in this physical environment we call Earth. However, our subjective experiences of time vary, from moment to moment and person to person. The biologist Johann von Uexküll captures this notion well when he states, "We know that there is not one space and one time only, but that there are as many spaces and times as there are subjects."

For centuries, poets have depicted their views of time in many brilliant ways. The ineffable nature of time lends itself greatly to poetic expression, just as in this sample by the poet Henry Van Dyke.


This poem suggests to me that each one of us, consciously or unconsciously, creates, shapes and colours our participation in the construct of time. Do you feel at ease with the perceived speed of your life? If not, how would you like to shift your relationship to time?