A Timeless Lifestyle

Clocks, phones, laptops, watches are just some of the numerous ways of checking the time. We need them because knowing what time it is is essential to the way we organize our days, from scheduled appointments and meetings, to knowing when to perform our daily habits (the basic ones and the ones we add to our schedule ourselves). An example of a restrictive way of scheduling time is time blocking, a method that was created in order to assign different activities to specific blocks of time, thus creating a strict daily structure. I wanted to experiment how the complete opposite of this daily structure would feel like and how it would affect my productivity and well-being, therefore right after I received a positive result to a PCR test, I knew I was given an opportunity for a small lifestyle change. I removed any time-telling device from my sight and started living 14 days like there was no pressure around me, focusing on my health.

At the beginning, not knowing what time it was was confusing. I randomly switched both my phone and my laptop to a random timezone and starting then, I was clueless about the time. The immediate effect was that I began feeling unusually relaxed, knowing that I was no longer dependent on a certain fixed schedule. I was able to sleep more and get the rest that my body and mind needed, and I also fed my body only when it asked for it. I was able to start the day with what I wanted to do and I could make my way through the day in a more intentional manner, constantly asking myself what I desire to do rather than what I need to do. My day started with practising good habits in the morning and creative and productive activities in the afternoon. Everything went on seamlessly and undisturbed, and the days felt increasingly longer and no longer packed with tasks. I was able to finish three books. I wrote three articles and filmed two YouTube videos. I drew 10 pages in my illustrations notebook. It seemed as though the time expanded and allowed me to freely make my way through it. It felt like my body and my mood took control over my life, unlike before when only my brain would lead me through the day. Nevertheless, no matter how liberating my days felt, something was missing. Without even realizing at first, every day I ended up doing the same things, in the exact same order. Funnily enough, I’ve always disliked routines, but it seemed that after all, my life really needed a structure. I believe this routine is what got me through each day without getting bored and lazy.

One day I had an appointment and had to check the time and switch the timezone to the correct one. Since then, I haven’t changed it back. I found myself eager to go back to the scheduled life from before. I think it might be because I am so used to guiding my activities after a clock, that it feels natural and “like home” when I do it. But I think the experience in itself was extremely insightful for me, for the reason that this break taught me a lot about my relationship with time and with productivity. Now I know that both freedom and structure are needed in a healthy and balanced lifestyle and I am willing to keep thinking how I can achieve that now that I recovered from covid.