Time flies when you’re having fun
Don’t let it pass by, grab it, and fly along
By Tijs Kramer
Creative Intern at VBAT
It’s hard to realise how fast the past weeks have gone by. Whether it’s because of the weather, the great assignments or all of it together, it doesn’t really matter. Because even though time is flying, it’s not passing by, I’m flying along with it.
For those who feel there’s not enough time in the world, just take a moment to realise, time isn’t a limiting factor in our lives, it’s a tool that we need in order to grow, progress and process what we’ve learned.
Of course, the time we have on this planet isn’t endless. But isn’t it foolish to spend the time we have, worrying about the moment we’ll run out of it?
Just recently I saw a video where an interviewer asked adults and elderly people what they dream of doing when they grow up. Almost instinctively all of them reacted with a puzzled look on their faces. As a spectator, you could clearly tell what happened in their heads. They must’ve thought: “What do you mean when I grow up? I already am a grown up.”
The fact is, the question that we’ve all been asked when we were kids is a horribly bad question which implies that one day we’ll be done growing up, that somehow, we’ve made it to the finish.
This question has been controlling our lives for generations and has lead people to believe that they’re there, or even worse, they’ve failed to become what they wanted and settled for something less. Our time doesn’t run out once we grow up, in reality, we never finish growing up. In other words, we don’t grow up to become grown ups, we grow up, so we can keep growing up.
All of our lives, we learn, we fight and we struggle, and in this process, we want a reward, we secretly wish there will be a time we can sit back and relax for eternity. But instead, we grow older, life becomes more challenging, responsibilities and to-do lists get longer and longer and ultimately we develop a lot of stress. We ask ourselves “Why?”. Then we go to the doctor to ask for a chill pill and for a moment our stress fades away, just to wake up the next day to the same circus. We fight symptoms of stress and fears instead of listening to them and embracing them.
But stress and fear are so uncomfortable, why face these issues? What’s the harm in it if we take something that helps us take our mind of these desolate feelings? Well, think of it this way, a lobster grows bigger and bigger, while its shell gets tighter and tighter. To a point where the lobster is in a lot of stress and pain, if it were to go to a doctor, the doctor will say: “Poor lobster, are you experiencing pain? Take this pill and all of that will be over.” The lobster agrees, takes the pill, and as promised, the pain fades away. But the lobster is no longer able to grow, its shell is as tight as it can be, and the lobster has to take these pills every day in order to feel no pain. The lobster’s younger brother is less fortunate, or so it seems. It has no money to go the doctor and is in a lot of pain, until one day the lobster is so sick of it that it sheds its shell. Finally no more pain! For a while the lobster is uncomfortable, it has no shell, out of its comfort zone. But over time it develops a new shell, one that fits, one that is even stronger than the previous one, one that doesn’t hurt.
Stress isn’t a symptom that’s telling us that something is wrong. Instead, it’s a symptom of growth, a symptom that helps us generate the willpower to shed our own shells, get out of our comfort zone, and allow ourselves to grow.
During my teenage years the media was booming with a lot of inspirational quotes like: “Life isn’t about the goal, it’s about the journey.” But slowly I start to see that it’s time to go a step further, to realise, there is no such thing as a goal in life, there is only a journey with checkpoints.
But where to, If you don’t have a goal to chase? Well, does a hurdler stop after he jumps the first hurdle? No, he looks ahead and sees there are 10 more hurdles to pass before the finish. And after the finish, he goes home, takes a rest, just to skip more hurdles the next day.
In conclusion it’s time for a generation that..
..doesn’t fight time, but instead lives it.
..doesn’t ask children what they want to be when they grow up, but asks them what they want to be.
..doesn’t fight stress and pain, but listens to it.
..doesn’t chase goals, but passes checkpoints instead.
Time flies when you’re having fun, don’t let it pass by, grab it, and fly along.
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Written by Tijs Kramer
Creative Intern at VBAT
edited by Connie Fluhme
PR at VBAT
