Time

I believe that one of the best emotions a human can feel is to be confronted with the passage of time — not just passively aware of it, but explicitly forced to look it in the eye — and instead of fear at the future, regret at the past, or any other bitter feelings that may come of facing the sands of your lifespan ebbing away, feeling a deep sense of calm and acceptance.

Conversely, I believe that one of the worst emotions a human can feel is to be confronted with the passage of time, and feel that such a reality is unwelcome, and be filled with bitterness, regret, and a reluctance to stare it down with steady breath.

These moments aren't common, lest you summon them. New Year is a time for reflection, but many drown it out with loud bangs and bright lights. Birthdays, too. It seems that any time we may find the world forcing us into reflection about our continual loss of time, we blare it out. If one doesn't make any concerted effort at any point in their life to truly consider their balance, they might well find that they are only confronted with it when it's almost depleted. Perhaps they become ill and acknowledge their mortality. Perhaps they lay upon their death bed, reminiscing. And if it doesn't truly feel like reminiscence, but regret, or sorrow — then perhaps you have failed. And this is why you must routinely assess yourself against your use of time. When New Year comes along, stare at your spending. If you died next year, would you be content with what you'd achieved and experienced in the time you had? Are you proud of how much you've done this year, towards progressing your goals? If not, what has blocked you? Is there any way you could have circumvented that?

That's easier said than done, of course.

We live in a world where our potential futures are rich and vivid but caged away behind a speculative number of locks. When we're young, we're told to strive to get a taste for what lies beyond our manacles, but in the same breath, told to be prudent — to collect as many keys as possible in the hopes that the cage can be unlocked — even if the sands of time are by then piling up on your back and lodged between your joints. If we have an ambition that we failed to fulfil, we tend to excuse it with platitudes like, "but I didn't have enough keys". If the number of locks were determinate, and the size of the chambers in your hourglass predictable, then that would be a sound argument. But they are not. You may simply leave a miserable skeleton, keys jammed in its eye sockets, and chains around its legs. This balance is perhaps one of life's greatest challenges.

When you're on your death bed — and most likely, that day will come — will you look back at your prior self with bitterness and hatred for squandering your time, or will you look at them with respect and gratitude, for enriching the memories you have now? You can't hope to get remotely close to the latter if you don't at least interrogate yourself a few times a year.

This all sounds very cliché, I know. There's nothing profound about this. But often that's the very reason people fail to realise their ambitions. It's cliché — frankly, it's a bit cringeworthy to sit there and reflect. We push it aside because the passage of time is such an obvious truth that we assume its passage will automatically be accompanied by the fulfilment of our goals. The keys will collect themselves — true, to an extent — and the achievements and experiences will be accrued in due course — also true, to an extent. It becomes comfortable to settle for that.

But it's not enough.

Materialise your "bucket list". Everyone has one; few give it the privilege of paper, or even a scrappy .txt file. Keep adding ambitions. You'll do that anyway. You never "complete" life. But always try to work towards a 70% completion rate. Or whatever your comfortable number is — to me, 70% is "more than enough done, still plenty to aspire to that gives life meaning". If you add a bunch on at some point, then commit to ticking a few off in the next year to get you up to your completion target. If you do a lot, what else do you want to do? It's okay to always have unfulfilled goals — they make life worth living — just as long as they don't topple the fulfilled ones.

To rattle a few items off my own list: I wanted to go to a few different places in Switzerland, I wanted to go paragliding, I wanted to set up a blog, and I wanted to go to both AWS re:Invent and Vegas at some point. I have done all of the above — among other things — this year. But I'd also like to go to Japan. I'd like to go to Prague. I'd like to go scuba diving. I didn't get chance for those this year — couldn't budget enough keys given the bits I've already done. That's fine; some padlocks were opened, at least. Prague is booked, Japan's itinerary is 80% compiled, and scuba diving is... currently manifesting as butterflies floating around my abdomen 😄 But I'll force myself by September, if the gumption doesn't happen naturally.

Get a Daruma doll. Yes, they work. No, not if you just imagine them as a piece of furniture. If you're a programmer, you might understand this if you've ever used something akin to a rubber duck. Imbue them with life. Character. Judgmentalism. I have four at the moment. Two don't have an ambition just yet. One of them has been sat on the shelf in my study for a few years now, piercing a hole in the back of my skull with its one eye, while I promise awkwardly that I'll give him his other next year. And I will. I'm sure he's not too grumpy with me — I'll be comfortably listening to "Time" by Pink Floyd this New Year's — that must count for something, at least.