While time flies
Yana Northen • 21 August 2025
In the flight of days — to find your inner compass.
Yesterday I was walking through the city after my workout. I had shopping bags in my hands and a list of tasks in my head. Everything was planned: go here, do this, then another thing, and suddenly I found myself thinking: how do others live?
I remembered myself when I was young. Studying at university, a little daughter, endless chores. Back then it seemed to me: “When my child grows up, I will finally have time for everything.” But my child grew up, and there was still no more time.
Today I am a grandmother of two grandchildren, and I still don’t have enough time. I need to cook, clean, work in the garden, complete assignments for my course, sort through the photographs I’ve taken, give attention to my relationships, go for a walk, read a book, and all this in between other things. Where can I find time for everything?
Within myself I realised: you shouldn’t wait for time to appear “someday.” I try to learn to arrange my day so that there is enough not only for duties, but also for joy. I remember literally “crawling” back from the garden, and then spending several days in pain. Now I set a timer: one hour of gardening — and that’s enough. But every day, and with pleasure.
The same goes for everything else. If I stay with one task too long, I begin to hate what I am doing, and it is important for me to switch, to refocus, to keep my zest for life.
I know: thousands of books and manuals have been written on how to organise time. Courses, coaching and advice. But no matter how many there are, responsibility always remains with the person — for how they live their life, for what they spend their days on. For me, this is not about management, but about awareness.
Life does not sit neatly on a shelf together with ready-made recipes from books. It is lived — here and now.
Time does not arrive tomorrow. It leaves — every minute, and only I decide whether I fill this day with fatigue and irritation, or with joy and inspiration.
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