Groundhog Day.
For those of us who are currently unemployed due to COVID-19, it’s interesting to think about the gentle hum of monotony that one can feel between days right now.
Is it Monday? Tuesday? Wednesday? Thursday? I don’t even know anymore…
It’s almost as if the measurement of time has been replaced with tasks as benchmarks instead of dial hands. What was it that I planned to do today? Did I already clean my house? Oh, what’s up next in the series? What chapter was I on in this book?
It’s moments like this that make you truly understand and reflect upon the idiom that time is merely a construct; or, rather, our organization of time is merely a construct. If there is no set second, minute, hour, day, month, or year to help guide us, then what do we have besides the rising and setting of the sun?
Look far back enough in history and you will find that there was no organized set structure for time beyond moments when we were mere hunter-gatherers (or “uncivilized”). It was only through the invention of time that we began to organize and utilize our “time” more effectively (making us “more civilized”).
What does it mean when all of our clocks have fallen away? What can we say, then, about the “time that we have left”? Perhaps, in hindsight, it isn’t the years that are tagged onto our life, but the life that we put into our moments that matters most. And with all this “free time” we find ourselves with right now, perhaps it’s time to ask ourselves two very meaningful and important questions: what am I doing with my time and what do I want to do if this idea of time were not a factor?
Well, you now have a moment to think about it. What will you do when “time” and the expectations that go with it come back into effect? Will it be what you want to do, irregardless of time? Or will it be what you believe you need to do because of it?
Just don’t turn a Groundhog Day into Groundhog Life… unless you want to, of course.
-get busy living, because we’re all already dying.