How technology plays with your sense of time

My feet landed on the gravel path. It was more difficult than I had hoped. A thought occurred to me: "Did I start too soon?" That is always my weak point. Technology can help, but in the end I have to do it myself. Go for the run, eating enough food in advance, taking rest and above all: not letting myself go crazy in the beginning of the training.

Start
It was a mile ago. Or actually: 4 minutes and 33 seconds ago. Then I had pressed the start button of my Garmin Fenix ​​HR3 sports watch. I had set that I wanted to run a distance of 5 kilometers. The watch knew what my current record was on the 5 kilometers and gave me the option: do you want to try to run faster? "Yes, of course!" I thought. After a short warm-up I started running.

Run against time.

Run against my virtual historical self that had set the record a few weeks earlier.

Time
Time is an absolute, relative and a philosophical concept.
It is absolute. For everyone on earth, a second is a second. There are atomic clocks that indicate the exact time in the world. But sometimes time is a relative concept. If I have to wait 2 minutes at the supermarket counter, I experience it 2 minutes differently than when I ski down on a slope in Austria.

Quantum physics
Time is also a philosophical concept. According to scientists in quantum physics, time is associated with space and physical laws, such as gravity and the position of the observer. Even more exciting are recent insights that the future has an influence on the past. But to be very honest, when it comes to time, we do not know a lot as humanity.

Observer
The observer. That's me. Not that I realize all that when I'm running. The only thing I notice are the numbers on my sports watch and the gravel path where my feet land with a cadence of around 90 touches per minute. I try to feel whether I can still accelerate or whether I should temporize.

Blessing or curse?
It is a few weeks until the race and technology helps me with the preparations. With a sport performance such as running a certain distance it is easy. I consciously choose to use technology to support me in achieving my goals.

But that is not always the case. Without you realizing it, you can be a victim of technology. I am often a defenseless victim of technology. Technology, in the form of e-mail, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, knows how to take my time.

The moment of 'now' I lose touch with apps and services that do everything to demand my attention.

That has little to do with a lack of willpower or discipline. For my podcast I interviewed NRC journalist Wouter van Noort who wrote a book about smartphone addiction. He told me that technology companies are doing everything to keep your attention. For that they use all sorts of psychological tricks for and even 'best practices' from gambling palaces in Las Vegas.

Surfer
Have you ever been on a surfboard to surf on a wave? My experience is limited to a week of surfing in Taghazout in Morocco and Canggu in Bali. Surfing consists mainly of long waiting and, especially as a beginner like me, a lot of trying. Often you are too early or too late with paddling or standing on the surfboard.

Very often it goes well. That is a magical feeling. It is not mechanical like with my running. It is a lot of trying, a lot of practice and feeling.

Kairos
You can also use the time to surf. Not just ordinary time, but especially qualitative time. The Greek philosophers looked at time in two different ways. Besides 'chronos' she also knew 'kairos'. Choros is the linear and measurable time. Kairos is more qualitative and involves valuable moments and memories.

At the Biohacker Summit 2017 in Helsinki, Chris Dancy told how he uses technology to experience more 'kairos'. Maybe you know Chris. Mashable declared him the 'most connected man' of the world in 2014.)

Memories from the past
The best way to live in Kairos is to make memories. You can do that by using metadata in a smart way. If you know when and where a photo was taken, the photo gets more context and meaning. Then a memory will live even more.

Chris Dancy goes one step further. He and he, his husband, take photos of moments and record the music of that moment through Shazam. Later, when they are at home, they relive the memory by playing the same music through Spotify and translating the photos into the colors of the Hue lamps. Chris Dancy: "In a sense, we have downloaded our memories to be able to play them back later".

Finish
The watch started to beep. Three more beeps and I was done. I knew that. During the 5 kilometers the Garmin had kept and accompanied me. I knew how many seconds I was under my personal record and I even managed to run even faster. A blissful feeling, despite the pain. I knew that pain was temporary.

Home
At home I could synchronize the Garmin with the Strava app. An image appeared on the screen: a map of my training with all geographic and biometric training data, such as distance, time, altitude, heart rate and cadence.

I thought: this is a picture of an experience. An extensive memory to experience again. Someday.