Most things that can be possessed can be replenished - but not
time!
Nothing that any of us does in this life will allow us to accrue
a moment's more time, and nothing will allow us to regain time
misspent. This is the key premise on which this book is
based, a premise that deeply resonated with me.
If
any of us thinking professionals were approached by a friend or a
colleague to invest in their business, I guarantee the first thing
we'd no doubt do, would be a cost-benefit analysis of sorts to
determine if the investment would be a good one. And the
thing is, even if you lost your money, you'd know you could replace
it by sheer hard work or better investments.
Thinking of time now, how many of you, and be honest here, have
accepted an invitation to a dinner from some annoying business
associates, knowing full well the evening would be a bore, and that
the time you spent could never be replaced? I once knew
this couple; they both were highly paid lawyers who regularly
accepted invites from people they didn't like! Ironically,
they, of all people should have known the value of time as an hour
of their time would cost you and I a fortune…
It's not surprising, then, that I found this idea of the new
psychology of time to be deeply intriguing, and particularly so
because of who wrote it: Professor Phil Zimbardo the researcher
behind the famous - infamous! - Stanford prison experiments.
To those of you who are unfamiliar with the field of Psychology,
Professor Zimbardo is one of the greatest living
psychologists. He was involved in the original Stanford
prison experiments and he is a global leader in studying evil,
shyness and now time. John Boyd PhD is a colleague of
Zimbardo's who worked closely with him developing his time
perspective Inventory. And together they have produced a book
which is extremely well researched, easily read and, most important
of all, ground breaking in its implications for our psychological
wellbeing.
I felt so strongly about this topic that I convinced a client
that they'd enjoy a presentation on it. If you are in a
business which is about time (or any other business) and time
orientation sounds like something to broaden your staff's horizons,
Professionelle would be happy to talk to you about delivering
a presentation on it within your organisation.
I came across The Time Paradox in an interview on www.mentorcoach.com, a
website dedicated to helping coaches excel - which I highly
recommend to those of you who are in the field. As the interview
progressed, I became sold and ordered the book the very next
day. This hardly ever happens with me and professional
books. I usually need convincing that they do indeed justify
the money and indeed the time invested in reading them.
Do you ever find yourself endlessly fretting about things that
have happened in your past - not able to let go and move on? Or
alternatively, are you the kind of person who has endless to-do
lists and is always thinking about the next project, the next job
so much so that sometimes you end up pouring coffee over your
cereal? If the answer is a little shy yes to either of these
questions then this book is a MUST for you.
The six time perspectives
The authors propose there are six time orientations. These
orientations have huge influence on how we experience and react to
the world around us, and yet we have little or any awareness of
them. Again, I have always been intrigued by how some people
who have experienced adversity manage to reframe their experiences
and reflect on the positive, and yet others seem to be forever
'stuck' in re-living these negative events. Reading the The Time Paradox has really opened my eyes to
the impact of this psychological time orientation, and hopefully,
after reading this review, you'll agree with me!
To whet your appetites, I decided to briefly outline each of the
six-time perspectives, and if ANY of it strikes a chord, I
wholeheartedly recommend you read this book.
The Past Positive
This time perspective describes people who love to reminisce and
remember the good old times, they make scrapbook of holidays, might
listen to classic old hits, love antiques and basically love to
think about the good things that have been. Put simply they
view the past through rose tinted glasses.
Past positives, as the authors refer to them are people who you
like having around and reminisce about the good old days.
They are also likely to take the time to be grateful for their
lives and to those people around them who have helped made their
lives the wonderful experience it has been. There are many
benefits to being high on past positive, all of which are
substantiated by research; there are no down sides, except that if
you are ONLY high on past positive you might be stuck in the past
and that can mean you are less likely to explore and develop.
Past Negative
Like the name suggests, people with a strong past negative time
orientation are those people who just can't seem to let go, they
are always bringing up old hurts, remembering all the wrongs that
have been done to them. Using a favourite Kiwi phrase of mine
'they have a big chip on their shoulders'. Unfortunately, according
to the authors, research suggests that women are more prone to this
category and a real danger lies in that they tend to associate with
other like-minded past negative women folk, which in turn
exacerbates this tendency.
There is nothing positive about having a Past Negative time
perspective according to research. What is especially
striking is that the research demonstrates how unreliable our own
memory is of events, and how our memory can be manipulated to hold
to past negative events that never happened but were planted in our
minds! As you'd expect, there is quite a lot of discussion on
the use of re-constructed 'forgotten' memories of sexual abuse in
therapy and criminal trials.
In fact, just like in the above example, throughout the book the authors demonstrate their points
using research and discussion of concepts from other spheres of our
lives ranging from suicide bombers to the demise of Enron. This
sort of wide-ranging illustrations of a point is one of the things
I liked most about this book.
Present Hedonists
Present hedonists are the life and soul of any party and
basically all seven year-olds fall into that category. They
live for the now, they enjoy all that life has to offer in the
moment and will use all kinds of substances to further their
enjoyment (hopefully not at seven though!). The sixties
Hippies were the classic present Hedonists. In the mentorcoach
interview with Professor Zimbardo he used that example to
illustrate why the hippie communes never lasted: because
no-one bothered making sure there would be enough money to feed the
troops tomorrow because everyone was busy living in the now.
A healthy dose of present hedonism is a good thing to have
according to the research; the danger is too much present-hedonism
or having only a present-hedonist time perspective. Present
hedonists don't have regular medical checks and don't floss their
teeth because they can't think of the future, it is all about the
now that matters to them - they find it impossible to imagine
themselves in the future.
Zimbardo himself was a son of Italian immigrants from Sicily who
was brought up in the slums of the Bronx. In his cultural
heritage past positive and present hedonism were the only time
perspectives. No one ever talked about what would or might
happen tomorrow and how one could influence future outcomes.
Tellingly, and astonishingly, the term for "future" does not even
exist in his native dialect!
Present Fatalists
The behaviour of people with this time orientation might appear
quite similar to those with a present hedonistic orientation - but
the reason for the behaviour is very different. Present
fatalists believe that nothing they do will make any difference now
or ever.
Present fatalists might take drugs, but unlike present hedonists
they won't be seeking pleasure from it but doing it because there
is nothing better to do. With present fatalists, resignation
and cynicism overwhelm hopefulness and optimism.
The news on the psychological outcomes for present fatalists
isn't good, they tend to have less self esteem, be more anxious,
perform worse as students and of course, be less happy.
Future Orientation
If you are a Professionelle member reading this review the
chances are that you are high on future orientation. Future
orientation is what drives us to go to University to spend at least
three years in relative poverty. It's in the knowledge that that
investment of time and money is likely to return higher yields
later in life than we'd get if we worked full time in a clothing
shop as a retail assistant..
Futures get regular medical and dental checkups. They are
more likely to have health and retirement plans. They are
more likely to prefer good nutrition to tasty but unhealthy food,
and they are less likely to smoke, drink heavily and engage in
binge eating. They are also less depressed than the general
population, perhaps because they do not spend time ruminating on
negative past experiences. The focus is on tomorrow, not
yesterday.
Are there any down sides to being future focused? Yes
there are. To my delight, these pretty much reflect my
thoughts about professional women and having fun.
Is there an ideal time orientation?
The answer is a clear yes. And you can take the Zimbardo Time Perspective
Inventory online here and find out how yours compares to
it.
Ever since reading this book back in January, I am forever
amazed how much relevance it has to every aspect of my life. I
strongly recommend it, and have since re-read it a number of
times. I have to confess that to deepen my knowledge I have
also read some of the scientific studies referred to in the book
and watched quite a few of the videos online.
Go on, give it a go!
Where to find it
If you'd like to read it for yourself, The Time Paradox
is published by Free Press and is available at Amazon:
In book form The Time Paradox: The New Psychology of Time That
Will Change Your Life
In a Kindle Edition The Time Paradox: The New Psychology of Time That
Will Change Your Life