I resigned

Five years had been the longest I’d been in a job before my current role. I always thought after about five years it would be time to move on. Nine years later I overcome my status quo bias and finally write that letter - while quietly castigating myself for not getting off my arse and doing it earlier.

Have I accumulated nine years of experience? Or one year’s experience nine times? I’m not a postie or a bus driver, so I persuade myself it’s the former. But then I advocate when traveling you should always go somewhere new, not back to the same place. This means I’ve been holidaying at the same joint for some time (figuratively speaking of course!). So, if I’m honest, there is probably more than just a smattering of the latter. Hence my putting pen to paper.

But I often wonder why we get fixated on specific time periods. Because time is a relative thing. One year can seem like an eternity, then five can go by in a flash. I remember 1976 moving slower than a glacier on flat land. This was because Mrs Hindmarsh and I did not have a great relationship. She was my teacher at Halcombe Primary that year. A rather formidable woman who made liberal use of her ruler for purposes never intended. I thought she was a rubbish teacher and I’ve no doubt she thought I was a rubbish student. I think we were both right.

I find it interesting how people use age as a yardstick when it’s such an inaccurate predictor of the many things people use it as a measure for. It’s a bit like using a temperature gauge to measure cloud cover. In some contexts, it could be reliable, but in most cases, it would be about as accurate as that Rolex you bought in Thailand.

I’ve met young people wise beyond their years and old people who wouldn’t feel out of place in a kindergarten. I’ve had delicious two-year-old wine and equally tasty ten-year-old wine and vice versa.

I recently caught up with a boss I worked for about 15 years ago and I could honestly say time had seemed to have stood still for him. Apart from a slight thickening of the girth, he was just the same. Yet a friend I recently caught up with who I hadn’t seen for years looked like father time had taken him out the back and given him a bloody good hiding.

All of which proves that time is often a rubbish rule of thumb. Its frequent use as a proxy for deeper assessment shows we are lazy and cannot be bothered being a little more curious. The brain likes shortcuts - but sometimes these shortcuts take us to the wrong destination.

The other interesting thing about time is how evenly distributed it is. Everyone gets 60 minutes in an hour, or 24 hours in a day. We cannot speed it up or slow it down. We cannot purchase an extra day in the week, or another week in a month. It’s a bit like gravity, infinitely present and unmovable. Something you can momentarily defy, but it always wins in the end (botox anyone?).

How we use it determines everything in our life. I’ve decided how I use my time this year is going to be different from the past nine. I’ve no idea how it will be different. I find that a little bit scary and but also intriguing. It’s like arriving in a new country with no itinerary. I just hope I don’t get mugged or crash my scooter!