It’s common knowledge that time seems to move faster the older you get. You may remember the summer between the 3rd and 4th grade. The last day of school had a feeling of freedom and excitement about the summer. June was full of new adventures and making new friends. July had its own mood and unexpected surprises. Then came the hot August with different activities and new ways of seeing things. In September you had to get new clothes and mentally prepare for school. Finally, on the first day of class your peers would ask what you did over the summer and it seemed there were so many memorable events to share. Now, as an adult, summer begins and ends rather quickly with comparatively few changes in your life. When you get to retirement age, one full year begins and ends seemingly very fast, and your routines pretty much remain the same. How can we best explain this phenomenon?
The subjective experience of time is relative to your age in relationship to others. I see it a ratio between ages. As an example, if I had a 30-year-old mother, her 5-year-old daughter, and her 60-year-old grandmother in a family counseling session, each would experience time differently. For the mother the hour-long session would seem to be just the right amount of time to discuss issues. For the grandmother it would be 30 minutes relative to the mother (1/2). For her things just got started and more time is needed to cover the topic. For the child, relative to the mother, she would have been in the room for 6 hours, because there is a 6:1 ratio with age. How long could a mother last in a 6 hour therapy session without feeling everything was being repeated and belabored? You can understand how the child would have great difficulty sitting still and staying focused.
One time I asked a mathematician to determine when half your life experientially was lived. It was a calculus equation and we used age 80 for a lifespan. When the mathematician showed me the graph, it was an upside down exponential curve. When it seemed appropriate, I would ask this question to my client: “Supposing you lived to the age of 80, when would half of your life be over?” Most guessed what appeared to be the obvious, age 40. In truth, experientially, half of your life is over by age 8 1/2. I would show them the graph and it highlighted the importance of early childhood experience. This is why things that happened to you as a child can be recalled with great intensity and importance. So an angry 30-year-old mother who sends their misbehaving 3-year-old to be alone in the bedroom for an hour as a punishment might reconsider that this might actually be excessive, and have unintended consequences. The mother would have to be alone for 10 hours to know what it feels like for the 3-year-old. Because it’s a 10:1 one ratio of age, the child only needs six minutes to be the equivalent of mother’s one hour. Children know when they are receiving excessive punishment but have difficulty expressing it.
To go even further with this, this means that the younger the child, the slower is their time relative to you. They are in a time warp, one that is nearly impossible for adults to fully appreciate. It does explain how children can learn so fast. They have more time to do it in. To delve into this a bit deeper, the first hours of lived life is almost an eternity. A newborn’s brain is developing at near miraculous speed and every moment is full of new learning. Consider a woman gives birth to a child at age 20. At one month of age, the ratio is 240:1. That means for every hour the mother experiences, the infant experiences 10 days relative to her. At even more extreme is the 80-year-old great grandmother. She would have to live out 40 days to know what it’s like for the one-month-old to live one hour. I often shared this with my clients who had children in order to help them understand how to appreciate the time differences between them and the rest of their family. For new mothers, I would tell them that their loving presence is critical in the healthy development of their child, and the first five years are the most important. Young children need to have a close, loving relationship with their mothers. Actually, its essential, and understanding how their moving through time is different can be helpful in making decisions relevant to their upbringing and flourishing.