“How we seek to spend our time may depend on how much time we perceive ourselves to have.”
By Atul Gawande in his book Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End
Imagine life as a buffet table, laden with all sorts of tantalizing treats.
There you are, standing before this lavish display of possibilities, deciding how to fill your plate.
Will it be the savoury main course of binge-watching TV shows, the sweet dessert of baking cookies, or maybe a healthy salad of social media scrolling?
But here's the twist: the size of your plate, or rather, how much you think you have left to fill it, affects your choices.
When you believe there's plenty of time left on the clock, you might take your sweet time, casually sampling this and that, without much urgency.
It's like strolling through the buffet line at brunch, leisurely deciding what to try next.
But then, imagine someone suddenly tells you the buffet is closing in ten minutes.
Suddenly, your approach changes. You start piling your plate higher, grabbing everything in sight, because who knows when you'll get this chance again?
The looming deadline transforms your behaviour, making you hustle to make the most of what's left.
That's what happens with time. When we feel like we have plenty of it, we tend to take things slow and easy.
But when we realise our time here is limited, we hustle to make every moment count. It's like the difference between a leisurely stroll and a mad dash to the finish line.
So, as we navigate life's buffet, let's remember that our perception of time isn't just a background detail—it's the spice that flavours every choice we make.
Whether we're savouring each bite or hastily grabbing whatever we can, it's all influenced by how much time we think we have left on our plates.
A combination of quality food in an appropriate amount would be good for life but the patience to select that is hard to attain