Focusing on the past leads to depression.
Focusing on the present leads to narcissism.
Focusing on the future leads to paranoia.
Not focusing on anything leads to stupidity/ignorance.
My conclusion:
It's probably best not to focus on things relating to time. You can think about them and make some preparations based on past experiences, of course, but go with the flow and don't let yourself get stuck thinking about time for too long or you might start focusing on it rather than the action you're planning.
Time is another of those human-generated concepts that causes stress in people's lives. However, though its creation causes much stress and has programmed our minds to not think in ways that disregard it, it is extremely useful for co-operative coordination.
While at work one can find that focusing on the work at hand rather than thinking about how much time they've been at work makes them happier. People say that time flies when you're having fun. Einstein says that time is relative. I say that time is an imaginary device, and its only purpose should be to coordinate teamwork and fun. It should never be used to pressure another person to work faster, as that encourages sloppy work and creates mistakes from their focusing more on how long it's taking them to get the job done. It should not be used to judge anyone's paycheck, as a person should be paid based on the quality of their work, not the amount of time spent on it.
I think something's out of whack, because as people expect things done faster and faster, we lose more and more patience. We also lose appreciation for true craftsmanship, and fewer people are taking the time to do decent work.
As one person does great work and another person slacks off, they are both paid the same due to their hours at work. The slacker might get fired, but that just means the other worker is expected to do both jobs due to the company not paying to hire another slacker. As this happens more and more often, more workers are expected to do more people's jobs within the same time limit.
Remove the concept of time from this entire situation, with the exception of using it as a method of telling people when they should arrive at work and, depending on the type of job, when they should go home. See what happens.
Unfortunately because of the way the concept of time has been burned into our brains, removing time from society in the manner mentioned above would cause chaos and lots of work not getting done. Without time as a motivator, people would feel to free to slack off with a lot of their work.
However, without time as a motivator, we would also see what these people truly want to do. As they slack off, we get to see what they do with their spare time. Without time as a motivator on the job, using it only as a method of getting people to be in the same place at the same time, and if they were paid based on the quality of work, maybe we would see more people in jobs where they find themselves happier. The ability to choose the job by the work rather than the money, being free to take the time to express themselves through their work.
So I'm having trouble concentrating on what I'm typing because of this loud and kind of obnoxious accordion playing going on in this room. So I'll just leave the profound thoughts at that and hope they make sense. In short, I don't like the way time is being used in society, and I don't like how it's making the world impatient. As people become impatient, they become frustrated. Frustration causes anger.
That Yoda quote comes to mind: "fear (of not finishing work on time) leads to hate (of your boss/company), hate leads to pain (from stress or working too fast), pain leads to suffering (loss of job or health issues from work)."
Anyway, these are just thoughts triggered by the first four lines of this post. I hope they were thought-provoking.
Then again, people say ignorance is bliss... Maybe line four isn't such a bad idea in most people's minds. Maybe that's why it seems like so many people are ignorant idiots.
