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Miscalculating perception of time

Suzanne

Suzanne

Well-Known Member
V.I.P Member
So, had been suffering from extreme lonliness for a while now; first time. Always valued "me" time, when hubby goes to work, but something shifted and found myself frightened of myself, I guess and it was so crushing that I just dragged myself around our small home. Made worse with the fact that having social anxiety, I cannot just go out and walk for a while!

Anyway, I discovered that when I am busy, I am less lonely, but also have this thing, where I have an appointed time for everything; get housework out of the way and then, guilt is not there for being online. But sometimes I have so much to do, that I think I will never get it all done and start panicking, and am always left surprised with how fast things get done, which left me feeling: what now? And even being online did not "cure" that sensation.

I do this for almost everything ie miscalculate the time.
 
I've cycled through long stretches of time in the manner you're describing.

Ignorant to what unlatches me from such phases, I often find myself wondering what I did diffently on a particular day when nothing matters but the joy of a productive day which includes a smidgen of social interaction.

I wonder how one finds the balance.
 
David Rosales said:
I've cycled through long stretches of time in the manner you're describing.

Ignorant to what unlatches me from such phases, I often find myself wondering what I did diffently on a particular day when nothing matters but the joy of a productive day which includes a smidgen of social interaction.

I wonder how one finds the balance.
Click to expand...

My husband is a neurotypical and cannot find the balance; in fact it is me, who can find the balance; just bad timing for me personally, as I demonstrated.

I have to socialise twice a week at least, due to being a christian and the idea is wonderful and frightening, but always left feeling wrung out and needing to breath and space. Never have the sense of: I did well, as it were.
 
To the point of miscalculating how long a task/chore will take. I do it ALL the time. To the point that I sometimes say "geez, why did I put that off, it took like xx minutes"

Although I do it the opposite way too, finding things take longer than I thought they would.
 
I have this too, and for me, I think it is because my thoughts are racing so fast that time SEEMS to be going agonizingly slow. When my autism "hit" this was one of the things that tortured me so much! 5 minutes in line was like 20 minutes. 8 hours in school was like 72 hours. The clock never moved but my thoughts were going all over and every second was just another opportunity to think horrible things.

Time does not exist in my brain.......it's like something made by man, like a trailer park or a donut or a Wal Mart........just there but why? I have no idea.
 
OkRad said:
Time does not exist in my brain.......it's like something made by man, like a trailer park or a donut or a Wal Mart........just there but why? I have no idea.
Click to expand...

Time is interesting. It is both subjective and objective. We (people) have divided it up for convenience sake into minutes, hours, days, etc. In that sense, it can be measured objectively... 5 minutes here is 5 minutes there. Time is also a dimension, just like space has dimensions (re: Einstein theory of general relativity). Generally it moves at a constant measurable rate, but is "bendable" just like other dimensions.

However, as OkRad points out the human brain can perceive time to be moving either faster or slower than the objective measure of a clock. 5 minutes waiting in line takes forever! The 2 seconds before a car crash also take forever. When I was a runner, sometimes (just sometimes) I would get in a zone just running and breathing and time would just slip by, an hour run would seem like minutes.

People also have different "internal clocks" (if you will). Some people think of time a linear and 1 dimensional (past-present-future). A form of synesthesia is that time is perceived as distance, the past is further away than the present. Time can also be thought of as a forever branching 3D fractal pattern, where the choices we make determine what "arm" of the pattern we travel.

I find time fascinating, both from a physics standpoint, and a human perception one.

Edit: umm, guess one of my aspie obsessions anyone?
 
I GET VERY LONELY BUT I KNOW I WONT ENJOY BEING WITH NTs
WATCHING NATURE DOCS HELPS AND WATCH NATURE IN MY GARDEN
THERE IS A BIRD CALLED A DUNNOCK ITS COMPLETELY FOCUSED ON EATING NEVER ANY NOISE FROM A DUNNOCK
 
It always seems like when I have a lot on my mind, it's the days where I don't have enough alone time to think about it. And stopping time isn't an option. The other day, in my book, I wrote this as, "Too many things were going through her mind. A cello lesson was the last thing she needed right now. She just wanted to hide in her room, stare into space, play 1010 or something. Sort out her thoughts. Sort out her life. But she had not time to do that, and she knew at this point that she couldn't freeze time. Because if she could freeze time, she would have done it by now."
 
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