The Pool Of Time
It took me some 15–20 minutes to write this article. It will take me another 10–15 minutes to publish this on all platforms. And then maybe it will take an hour or two to explore those platforms more. And the laptop on which I was doing all this, will take another hour to buy itself and some other stuff I need in life. I use this laptop for many purposes, one of which but not totally exclusive is gaming, and between those gaming sessions, perhaps a movie or a TV show.
In the 24 hours I have, between just the digital life I live, I’ll easily give away some 6–8 hours each day to things that are craving for my time and attention. Maybe this happens to you too. Every morning when you wake up, you think you’re going to do certain things and not let other things distract you. Every morning, almost every human thinks (s)he is going to do all the stuff in the world and be happy in life. But that seldom happens.
Out of the 24 hours we are familiar with, each thing in this world takes its own share. Products from companies, services you need, things you do, stuff you enjoy, content that is important, media that is addictive and moments you cherish. Every single thing in your life demands your time and you only have so much to give.
For companies, it is a constant struggle. The behemoths have the easy game, the little ones form their niches. On the internet itself, there are nooks and corners where some random groups of strangers dedicate their ‘oh so little time’ on doing things that only very few people will ever see. Every single person who lives and earns by making things that live off of time in humans’ life are in a very hard game. And almost everyone has a product/service that demands time to make money. It’s not big data or artificial intelligence or lined up features that companies need, it’s time. Our time.
And every time a new company or person comes in the game, demanding from the human populace a bit of time, it kills another company/person that was leeching on that time before. It is a zero-sum game. The pool of time only has a limited number of buckets and there is a long line with each person demanding a larger and larger share of the pool.
With around 7.666 billion people on the planet right now, we have a pool of roughly 67 trillion hours, out of which we sleep for a third, and that leaves us with some 40 trillion hours, dedicated to doing something in life. 40 trillion hours are divided into every single thing you do in your life. And that pool of time is used to the last drop.
You prioritize and companies hypnotize you, for the optimum use of the pool, for you or for the company. And how this tense situation, pushes us to farthest and the most extremist of ways, is something to think about. And now that I have used some time out of the pool and made you read and think, I shall leave you with a hole, which of course will fill itself in time and some other thing in your life will come and start taking its own share again. It is the pool of time, more than anything, that we are so passionately after.
