One of the drivers of the speedaholic culture is our vexed relationship with time itself. Why is there never enough time? What is the best way to use time? Can we slow it down? Or speed it up? What exactly is time? An Italian graphic designer has now launched an intriguing project that tackles some of these questions visually. She is inviting people of all ages from around the world to submit a drawing that depicts the passage of time. Already hundreds have submitted their vision of time’s winged chariot in motion. Some are easy enough to deciper: a watch on a wrist; a cafeti√®re pouring coffee into a cup; an arrow flying through the air. Others are more enigmatic: undulating waves; a series of bubbles; lines coiled into the shape of a wind-sock. The site really gets you thinking about time and how to relate to it. It’s also fun to see other people’s take on it. Check out the site by clickingVisualization of Time Project. And while you’re there, why not take a little time to send in your own portrait?
Category: Thinking
Slow Mandarin
I don’t speak the language, but I am told there is a word in Mandarin, “kuai-huo, ” that means “cheerful” or “thrilled.” It is made up of two characters whose literal meaning is “fast living.” When In Praise came out in Taiwan last year, the publisher coined a new word for the title: “man-huo,” which means “slow living.” Apparently, “man-huo” has now entered the Taiwanese vernacular, with people using it as shorthand to describe a better way of doing pretty much everything.
Maybe I’ll try it out on the waitresses at our local dim sum restaurant in London. Sometimes they could do with putting on the brakes a little….
Musings on time
Writing the new book is absorbing all of my energy at the moment so the blog, along with almost everything else, has taken a back seat. But to prove I’m still here, and that I haven’t slowed down so much that I’ve fallen into a coma, I’m posting a couple of quotations sent to me by a reader. They hit the nail right on the head:
But what minutes! Count them by sensation, and not by calendars, and each moment is a day.
— Benjamin Disraeli
Half our life is spent trying to find something to do with the time we have rushed through life trying to save.
— Will Rogers