“When God created time, he made plenty of it.” (Irish/Celtic saying). Why then does it feel like we never have enough of it?

Why is there never enough time for the things we want to do and for the people we want to spend time with? You can give an easy answer and say: “Time flies!” and it is true! Tempus fugit!

Last week I met a person who told me:

“No, I don’t want to wear a watch. It will constantly remind me that time is short and drive me through the day.” As a watchmaker, I love watches. Not because they tell me the time and constantly remind me to hurry up. No, my watch helps me to slow down. I sit down, take the watch’s crown between my thumb and index finger and turn it slowly.

I enjoy the sound of winding my watch. My eyes follow the second hand, its steady journey around the center. I turn my watch and see the movement through the sapphire back: an entire universe in a small box. The balance is oscillation, the wheels are turning. The power comes from the main spring that I just wound up. A perfect mechanism, beautiful to observe. Living in a complex world, a mechanical watch is so simple and therefore so fascinating. I can see with my own eyes and hear with my own ears how it is working. Maybe that is why I became a watchmaker.

In these moments of slowing down 

… I start to think about time. For each one of us, the day has 24 hours. Some people have the privilege to decide what to do with their time. Some people don’t. But everyone has 24 hours: Rich or poor, old or young, tall or small. Our watches break these 24 hours down: Into hours, minutes and seconds. Simple math. But we all experience time differently. Some moments feel very long and boring and we wish that they would be over soon: the last department meeting, a lesson in school or waiting in a traffic jam.

These are the moments when time seems to be dragging. But the older you get, the faster the days, weeks and years fly by. Why do we feel like this? Probably because of fewer and fewer expectations or anticipation with growing age. As a child, you can’t wait for the next event. Children constantly ask:  “When is my birthday? How many sleeps until Christmas? When are we finally there?” But when we grow up, we think: ‘Oh, Christmas, again!’ We don’t have the same anticipation and joy for those things because they have become normal to us.

What are the things you can’t wait to do or the people you are joyfully waiting for to meet?

Every morning I wake up early and cannot sleep later than 4 or 5 am. Why? Because I cannot wait to go into my workshop and work on my watches.

Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.

My daughter has them several times a day: Moments where she is so awed, surprised and happy that she shouts it out loud because …

"When God created time, he made plenty of it." (Irish/Celtic saying)
Why then does it feel like we never have enough of it - for the things we want to do and for the people we want to spend time with? You can give an easy answer and say: “Time flies!”, and it is true! Tempus fugit!

In a fast-moving world where everything must be quick, efficient and cheap, we are used to doing different things at the same time, communicating with different people on different channels about different topics and trying to focus on several things at once.

We try to be omnipresent in order to not miss out on something. The result is that we lose the ability to focus on one thing for a longer time. But if you want to achieve something significant, exactly this ability is needed.

It’s a new start, a new year. It’s a new day and a new chance.

Maybe you have already given up on half of your New Year's resolutions. Or you did not even have any this year. Don’t worry! You don’t need a new year to start over. Often, it’s not the future we are afraid of. It is the fear of repeating the past that makes us anxious.

Steffen Cornehl repairs and restores antique mechanical watches – he has been crazy about time for more than 20 years now. Big historical watches in museums in St.Petersburg and small distinctive pocket and wrist watches that are very dear to their owners. Crazy about time.