My newest invention, a Time Machine
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My newest invention, a Time Machine
Well all this should make me rich. Wonder if I should file a utility patent with the USPTO? Maybe a provisional?
All kidding aside, I have figured out what many have tried to develop, a time machine. No we cannot go back in time but we can slow time. I met with Ted Turner in 2002 with several other businessmen and he told us that the one thing he would never relinquish (we were discussing his divorce with Jane Fonda) was his private jet. Part of this was his bravado of course but part was the fact he viewed his plane as a time machine. It gave him back more of the time he lived because he was not going through security, flying into regional airports vs larger less convenient airports etc. This is depicted on NetJets as a selling point for those that care.
I view time as relative. As we age the relative speed increases. A year to a one year old is their entire life, so it feels like forever to go from one to two because it is. Dave Mathews sings about this in Gravedigger. Yet when we are forty, as I am a year is one fortieth of my life. I found over the past decade that the relative speed of time for me dramatically increased. What I did not understand is the impact of addiction on this relativity. Given my conscious hours we fewer in a year when I was active, then becoming sober is actually giving me time back, changing the relativity.
Wow. So I just saved $50M on a Gulfstream IV and I got time to slow relatively speaking. Kidding aside these past 11 months (almost) have seemed like a car in idle. When I was active life was passing me by life I was driving 150mph. I needed to slow to 65mph and this felt boring at first. However, as I grow into my own skin I have noticed that being present in my life has allowed time to relatively slow and give me back more moments then I had before.
Based on the transitive property, sobriety is the fountain of youth!
All kidding aside, I have figured out what many have tried to develop, a time machine. No we cannot go back in time but we can slow time. I met with Ted Turner in 2002 with several other businessmen and he told us that the one thing he would never relinquish (we were discussing his divorce with Jane Fonda) was his private jet. Part of this was his bravado of course but part was the fact he viewed his plane as a time machine. It gave him back more of the time he lived because he was not going through security, flying into regional airports vs larger less convenient airports etc. This is depicted on NetJets as a selling point for those that care.
I view time as relative. As we age the relative speed increases. A year to a one year old is their entire life, so it feels like forever to go from one to two because it is. Dave Mathews sings about this in Gravedigger. Yet when we are forty, as I am a year is one fortieth of my life. I found over the past decade that the relative speed of time for me dramatically increased. What I did not understand is the impact of addiction on this relativity. Given my conscious hours we fewer in a year when I was active, then becoming sober is actually giving me time back, changing the relativity.
Wow. So I just saved $50M on a Gulfstream IV and I got time to slow relatively speaking. Kidding aside these past 11 months (almost) have seemed like a car in idle. When I was active life was passing me by life I was driving 150mph. I needed to slow to 65mph and this felt boring at first. However, as I grow into my own skin I have noticed that being present in my life has allowed time to relatively slow and give me back more moments then I had before.
Based on the transitive property, sobriety is the fountain of youth!
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Originally Posted by jdooner 
I view time as relative. As we age the relative speed increases. A year to a one year old is their entire life, so it feels like forever to go from one to two because it is. Dave Mathews sings about this in Gravedigger. Yet when we are forty, as I am a year is one fortieth of my life. I found over the past decade that the relative speed of time for me dramatically increased. What I did not understand is the impact of addiction on this relativity. Given my conscious hours we fewer in a year when I was active, then becoming sober is actually giving me time back, changing the relativity.
When I stopped drinking, I also noticed how much time I had in relation to drunk time. While drinking, it seemed like the night just flew by, so when I suddenly had hours to fill, I felt a little adrift. I like your approach to it though, seeing it as getting time back. Thanks jdooner.
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I have noticed this, too. I sometimes wonder if it is because I am calmer and no longer have this crazy, over-charged sense or urgency about every little thing, which was a manifestation of my alcohol abuse. I never felt like I had enough time before but now I usually do. I am more relaxed.
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Quitting drinking has made me so aware of time, and I do feel it's slowed down dramatically. Yes that's a bit boring sometimes, and if there's a craving or stress it's quite maddening. But mostly I love the freedom of being present. Fountain of youth in more ways than one!
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When I was active life was passing me by life I was driving 150mph. I needed to slow to 65mph and this felt boring at first. However, as I grow into my own skin I have noticed that being present in my life has allowed time to relatively slow and give me back more moments then I had before.
voices ca**y
Join Date: Mar 2013
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That goes really well with a song I just heard
Boston-Cool the Engines - YouTube
Congrats on 11 months. Don't fall for that I can have a few now and then trick if it comes up at the 1 year mark.
Boston-Cool the Engines - YouTube
Congrats on 11 months. Don't fall for that I can have a few now and then trick if it comes up at the 1 year mark.
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Wow having one of my kismet moments. So every Wednesday my youngest has speech therapy, the waiting room is shared with a family therapist (should probably pop in on her as well 
). Anyway she has a giant whiteboard with different quotes to ponder each week. Every week I take a picture of them to read when I have some alone time. Each morning I awake rather early no later than 5 am. This is my attempt to grab a little extra, "time" when my life is moving at its slowest pace. I opened the photo of the weeks quotes and here it is......kismet
"There comes a time when the world gets quiet and the only thing left is your own heart. So you'd better learn the sound of it. Otherwise you'll never understand what it's saying."
-Sarah Dessen, Just Listen
"For what it’s worth: it’s never too late or, in my case, too early to be whoever you want to be. There’s no time limit, stop whenever you want. You can change or stay the same, there are no rules to this thing. We can make the best or the worst of it. I hope you make the best of it. And I hope you see things that startle you. I hope you feel things you never felt before. I hope you meet people with a different point of view. I hope you live a life you’re proud of. If you find that you’re not, I hope you have the courage to start all over again."
-Eric Roth, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button screenplay
"Sometimes I feel like if you just watch things, just sit still and let the world exist in front of you - sometimes I swear that just for a second time freezes and the world pauses in its tilt. Just for a second. And if you somehow found a way to live in that second, then you would live forever."
-Lauren Oliver, Pandemonium (Delirium, #2)
"Time is an equal opportunity employer. Each human being has exactly the same number of hours and minutes every day. Rich people can't buy more hours. Scientists can't invent new minutes. And you can't save time to spend it on another day. Even so, time is amazingly fair and forgiving. No matter how much time you've wasted in the past, you still have an entire tomorrow."
-Denis Waitley
"Time isn’t precious at all, because it is an illusion. What you perceive as precious is not time but the one point that is out of time: the Now. That is precious indeed. The more you are focused on time—past and future—the more you miss the Now, the most precious thing there is."
-Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
Oh and lastly when I met with Ted Turner he said he'd never relinquish his Traitor "Hanoi Jane" Fonda photo!
. So every Wednesday my youngest has speech therapy, the waiting room is shared with a family therapist (should probably pop in on her as well ). Anyway she has a giant whiteboard with different quotes to ponder each week. Every week I take a picture of them to read when I have some alone time. Each morning I awake rather early no later than 5 am. This is my attempt to grab a little extra, "time" when my life is moving at its slowest pace. I opened the photo of the weeks quotes and here it is......kismet "There comes a time when the world gets quiet and the only thing left is your own heart. So you'd better learn the sound of it. Otherwise you'll never understand what it's saying."
-Sarah Dessen, Just Listen
"For what it’s worth: it’s never too late or, in my case, too early to be whoever you want to be. There’s no time limit, stop whenever you want. You can change or stay the same, there are no rules to this thing. We can make the best or the worst of it. I hope you make the best of it. And I hope you see things that startle you. I hope you feel things you never felt before. I hope you meet people with a different point of view. I hope you live a life you’re proud of. If you find that you’re not, I hope you have the courage to start all over again."
-Eric Roth, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button screenplay
"Sometimes I feel like if you just watch things, just sit still and let the world exist in front of you - sometimes I swear that just for a second time freezes and the world pauses in its tilt. Just for a second. And if you somehow found a way to live in that second, then you would live forever."
-Lauren Oliver, Pandemonium (Delirium, #2)
"Time is an equal opportunity employer. Each human being has exactly the same number of hours and minutes every day. Rich people can't buy more hours. Scientists can't invent new minutes. And you can't save time to spend it on another day. Even so, time is amazingly fair and forgiving. No matter how much time you've wasted in the past, you still have an entire tomorrow."
-Denis Waitley
"Time isn’t precious at all, because it is an illusion. What you perceive as precious is not time but the one point that is out of time: the Now. That is precious indeed. The more you are focused on time—past and future—the more you miss the Now, the most precious thing there is."
-Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
Oh and lastly when I met with Ted Turner he said he'd never relinquish his Traitor "Hanoi Jane" Fonda photo
!
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Thank you for sharing that. When I was drinking I had a lot of blackouts and lost moments and I was miserable sober. Now, I am grateful and ask for guidance to what I should do with the time I am given. Yeah, I appreciate it a lot more.
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my brother just told me "you have been unconscious for 95% of the last three years so don't act like you know me." it hurts but it is so true. I hope in time I can change that and be present and be able to tolerate the passing of minutes, hours, days, and years. Thank you for this post
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Originally Posted by sunnyside1
my brother just told me "you have been unconscious for 95% of the last three years so don't act like you know me." it hurts but it is so true. I hope in time I can change that and be present and be able to tolerate the passing of minutes, hours, days, and years. Thank you for this post
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Originally Posted by readerbaby71
Congrats on 11 months! I appreciate your posts and point of view, even when I don't agree, LOL. Thanks for being here.
If you want a chuckle go back in my history, maybe Sept timeframe when Alpha and I got into it and I told her she was like Mel Gibson or something to that effect. That is why we joke about the Blow Me comment. I consider her a close friend.
Anyhow we are good, and I too appreciate your contributions - takes a village.
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Hi JD, I like what you wrote in the OP.
On the subjective perception of time, there are studies where older people were asked where they would subjectively draw the middle point of how they experienced the passage of time. Most of them put it somewhere in their late teens, around 18 or even earlier.
As for our subjective perception while drinking, I think the years run by also because we are not really present to our life. One of the things I enjoy greatly in sobriety is how rich my experiences have become in every possible way. I can do less and in definitely less extreme ways, yet the experience feels much more complex and interesting. Almost overwhelming sometimes, but it's good
On the subjective perception of time, there are studies where older people were asked where they would subjectively draw the middle point of how they experienced the passage of time. Most of them put it somewhere in their late teens, around 18 or even earlier.
As for our subjective perception while drinking, I think the years run by also because we are not really present to our life. One of the things I enjoy greatly in sobriety is how rich my experiences have become in every possible way. I can do less and in definitely less extreme ways, yet the experience feels much more complex and interesting. Almost overwhelming sometimes, but it's good
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Thanks haennie...I agree. Two things sort of jump out from your comments. One is emotional maturity. I have read that when we start drinking and using we stunt our emotional growth. I believe when we engage in our addictions we stunt our emotional growth. For me this happened before my first drink and drug and so this process has been an aging where my psyche needs to catch up to my true age. As such the subjective passage of time has slowed massively over the past eleven months.
Alcohol was one of my core addictions but recovery has shown me the extent of my addictions substance and behaviorally. It is interesting how I was almost never present in my life unless engaged in my addictions. When I am active nothing else matters. This obsession can occur when drinking and I take the extra few drinking knowing I have a big meeting in the morning but casually disregard that event for the present drink. For those that indulged in cocaine, well that made me feel the most present ever. Nothing and I mean nothing matter except what was in front of me at that moment in time with utter disregard for everythgin else in life.
I feel the same actually with sports. I have been trained to focus and block out everything else. Business if a negotiation, you never want to be the first to speak while closing, again I am totally present with nothing else in life that matters. All of my compulsions allow me to live in the present but not all of my compulsions are sustainable. It becomes another of life's paradoxes to me at least.
Alcohol was one of my core addictions but recovery has shown me the extent of my addictions substance and behaviorally. It is interesting how I was almost never present in my life unless engaged in my addictions. When I am active nothing else matters. This obsession can occur when drinking and I take the extra few drinking knowing I have a big meeting in the morning but casually disregard that event for the present drink. For those that indulged in cocaine, well that made me feel the most present ever. Nothing and I mean nothing matter except what was in front of me at that moment in time with utter disregard for everythgin else in life.
I feel the same actually with sports. I have been trained to focus and block out everything else. Business if a negotiation, you never want to be the first to speak while closing, again I am totally present with nothing else in life that matters. All of my compulsions allow me to live in the present but not all of my compulsions are sustainable. It becomes another of life's paradoxes to me at least.
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