I often wonder why some weeks go faster than others, or why simple tasks can take hours to complete, when on some special days, they only take me a fraction of the time they usually take. As I get older it becomes more apparent that time bends to our emotional state.
It’s January, and the first day of the second semester of 3rd grade, when I get to school, I rave to my friends about all the gifts I got on Christmas: that new flashy toy, and an arts and crafts kit. Back then, the start of a new year felt like I was standing on the bottom of Mount Everest, endlessly stretched, and next Christmas was on top. My birthday in March was practically unreachable. Each day felt like a week, and each week like a month. Possibly because I was always yearning for something, waiting for recess, waiting for the weekend, waiting for the next holiday, I was never living in the present.
Now, it’s all different, the year does not wait for me, it just goes on, and at moments it seems capable of leaving me behind. I blink and it’s already April, the month after my 15th birthday. Suddenly Christmas is right around the corner and I couldn’t seem to notice where all the time went. One question echoes, have I done enough with the fleeting time I have been given? The once dreadful long May does not seem so unappealing now that it’s December and another year has gone by without my permission.
Maybe you have felt this too, when a school year seemed endless as a child, but now entire months slip by without notice.
It makes me wonder if time was really slower then, or was it just my perception? In an article by Medium, it states that as we fall victim to pattern and predictability, our brains process familiar experiences more efficiently which means they require less attention and create less detailed memories. When we look back, these routine periods seem to have passed quickly because they didn’t create many memorable moments. This is why maybe, my regular school week seems to fly by so quickly, because it’s all familiar to me, whereas in 3rd grade, school was still fairly new and exciting.
So then, why does “time fly when we are having fun”. We have all heard this phrase so much it is practically drilled into our heads. I do believe it true because time does tend to “fly” when I am having fun. Last Semana Santa, Easter, we got three days off of school, along with the weekend, which meant five days straight of pure bliss, where all I could hear was laughter and silly chatter. I had invited some of my friends to the beach, who to this day quote memories we will remember for a lifetime. Those five days melted together, and soon enough it was Monday again.
Even though that long weekend was packed with new and exciting anecdotes, that were the least bit predictable, why did it feel like only an instant? “Time flies when you are having fun”, because in the moment, you aren’t counting seconds, just like eight-year-old me did, but you’re too immersed in the moment to notice them. Time itself does not change, but how we perceive it certainly does, and that’s what makes it feel like it speeds up or slows down. When we were children everything was new so the days seem everlasting. When growing up our brain compresses routine working to find the unpredictable moments. And when we’re having fun, we’re so absorbed in the present that time sneaks away unnoticed. Maybe that’s the point, the more we actually enjoy the moment, the less we care about time, because we’re too busy living it.
MLA:Mandal, Amisha. “Why Does Time Seem to Speed up as We Get Older?” Medium, 18 June 2025, medium.com/@mandalamisha16/why-does-time-seem-to-speed-up-as-we-get-older-470382052948. Accessed 18 Sept. 2025.
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