How to feel you're living longer: time and memory and why it seems to go faster as we get older

Monday mindfulness

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Sandy Denny - Who Knows Where The Time Goes? (John Peel Show, 1973)

I was listening to Soul Music on Radio 4 this week. The song was one I did not know: Sandy Denny 'Who Knows Where the Time Goes?', which she wrote when she was 19. It's a very poignant song about the passing of things and how we experience time and loss. The programme brought together various people who had been touched by the song and at the end David Eagleman was interviewed. He is a neuroscientist and has studied time and how we perceive it, his interest in this growing from an experience he had as a child. He described how as a child he fell off a roof and as he did so had time to consider if there was anything he could grab hold of and also to think that this must be how Alice felt as she fell down the hole - before hitting the ground.

Latter when David Eagleman studied physics he worked out how long it had taken him to fall, and was astonished to realise that what had seemed like a long duration in terms of his thoughts and observations, had only taken .8 of a second. This reminded me of my experience of being knocked off my scooter as a 17 year old. I was going along happily making my way home when a car pulled out of a side road in front of me. I saw it and knew there was no way to avoid hitting it side on as I pulled on the brakes and tried to swerve to avoid a direct hit. I hit it side on and was thrown over the car onto the opposite side of the road. As this happened I had the most bizarre experience of time seeming to stop and be vast as I felt my self in the air. I remember seeing my whole life as a film, playing in front of my eyes. And I had the thought "it's not time to go yet I have things still to do". With this I felt a thud as I landed on the road. I sat up, my chin bleeding. I looked around, and said "I have the most frightful headache!".

The rest of the day proceed at normal time, with the trip to hospital, going into surgery for my chin to be stitched. Recovering. But I was left, as with David Eagleman, with a sense that time is not what we think it to be. In the space of a second I felt that I had had time to review my whole life - all 17 years it at that point, so not so much - but still more than I would usually be able to remember in a second!

Now as a 46 year old man I notice how for both myself and friends we all have the experience of time passing so much more quickly than as a child. I remember how as a child the long Summer holiday really did feel as if it was a universe of time - it seemed like a vast expanse of weeks, full of adventure and long summer days. Now I reach the end of the year and wonder where 12 months have gone!

David Eagleman addresses this as well in the programme and what he says has really fascinated me. His interest in time has led him to study how we perceive time and he has found that there is a reason time seems to last longer as a child. Children are learning about the world - it is all new and full of wonder and surprises. The brain is still building up its template by which it will read the world so is constantly learning and taking in new information to assimilate and file. As an adult we've learnt the rules and patterns that govern our perception of the world and so are not laying down new memories. As a result of this there is less for the brain to do to process and store each day and thus less of a sense of time being long and expansive as each day is like the last and passes without note or novelty.

Think of it as going on a journey for the first time. You look at the landmarks, orient yourself, notice how to navigate your way along the route. But once this has become familiar after several journeys, you soon slip into auto pilot, not even needing to pay that much attention to where you are going in order to arrive. I remember this experience even as a child - for some reason the route to my Uncle's always seemed longer on the way there, whereas driving back always felt faster - although it was the same time and same route. What if our life is like this - having become familiar with it, it just goes by quickly?

David Eagleman suggests that to give ourselves the sense of living longer - or at least slowing down the perception of how fast time is passing - through seeking novelty. If we give our brain something new to learn or do it will once agin have to store new learning, memories and experiences, making the perception of time slow down. I remember on an 8 week mindfulness course we were talking about auto pilot, which is the theme in week 1. Some people really reflected on how they had fallen into automatic ways of behaving and started to take a different route to the station on leaving work. They said how amazing it was to walk a new route after years of always going the same way, and how much more enjoyable it was to have this sense of novelty. Perhaps as well as finding new routes in our outer life, though walking different streets to get to a familiar destination, we can also take new routes in our life: learning a new hobby, trying out a new way of being, or as mentioned last week finding a new way to start our day - for me this has been by dancing in my room rather than our usual routine of starting the day!

The other place you can notice this relativity of time is in meditation itself. On any Monday evening there will be those who feel that the 25 minutes of the sit went by so quickly. Whilst for others the sit will have seemed to be an eternity. In that sense there is no such thing as 25 minutes. There is only our perception of time in the present moment. And that changes depending on how we are relating to the present moment as it arises in our experience. Wanting an experience to be over, it seems to go on for ever. Wanting it never to end, it seems to go all too quickly. This makes boredom in meditation a very valuable place to work. All we are doing is sitting, resting our attention on the breath - so there is nothing really to object to in this experience. But when the heart-mind does not want to settle in the moment there is a sense of struggle and this can give rise to a feeling of boredom or irritation: either way the desire is the same: for the meditation to be over. By sitting with this experience it is possible to learn that time exists as a perception and changes when I change how I am relating to my experience in the present moment. Become interested in the sense of boredom and suddenly instead of the time dragging until the bell goes it will pass quickly.

This applies in our our life as well as our meditation practice. There is a fantastic scene in Metropolis where a worker is waiting to be relived from his shift. As he looks at the minute had of the clock it seems to last an eternity before clicking the last minute to the end of the shift. I remember this experience myself when I was working as a customer service assistant on London Underground. Standing at the gates looking at the clock for the last five minutes of my shift seemed to last longer than all the hours I had worked! So this seems to point to a paradox. If we take what David Eagleman has said about time seeming to last longer when we approach things with a fresh and questioning mind but that it also slows down when we are disengaged and bored. Perhaps the difference is the sense of alive engagement. In boredom and the feeling of life passing by too quickly there is a sense of not being fully present in the experience of living. In both an engaged and curious exploration of life through being fully in the moment and the experience of life being novel and new through finding ways of living that step out of our routine habits, there is a sense of aliveness in the moment.

Enjoy your week.....and perhaps try something new!!

To read any previous group emails click here for my blog

Peace,

Nick Kientsch

www.evolvingminds.org.uk

NOTE: anyone interested in a glamping option of a Yurt at the Queer Spirit festival for £100, please email me your number and I'll put you in touch with Thanos who is already booked in but is looking for someone to share it with him.

Community Notice Board

QUEER SPIRIT FESTIVAL 2017

5 days of nature, magic, creativity, community and love!

Thoulstone Park Events

Thoulstone, BA13 4AQ Chapmanslade

(about a 2 1/2 hour drive from London or accessible by train and taxi)

The second Queer Spirit Festival is taking place at a beautiful site in Wiltshire, easily reached by train or road, with ceremonies, performance, dance parties, campaigns, fire circles, stunning countryside to relax in and over 50 skilled facilitators offering a diverse and unique line up of activities and workshops. There are workshops to stretch body and mind, to uplift and connect soul and spirit, to honour and explore sexuality and to expand the possibilities of queer consciousness.

I went last year and it was an amazing time of community, sensual exploration, heart based connections, play, relaxation and celebration. The festival creates a heart space where you are invited to feel more deeply into who you wish to be and how you wish to be. There is a fantastic sense of belonging, of being in a Queer space where however you wish to be is allowed: to walk naked in the woods, to dance in the moonlight or sit and have a quiet cup of tea chatting with friends. There is no pressure to conform to any idea of how you should be, instead you are invited to be how you wish to be, free from the constraints of fearing what others will think or say.

To explore the different workshops and events on offer in more detail click here

I will be leading meditation sessions and there is a diverse range of workshops and activities over the festival so you can create an experience unique to your interests. For an over view of the workshops on offer see below.

Workshops range from events open to all ages to those for 18 over only. Some include nudity. Naturism is a part of the ethos of the event so for those who enjoy to be naked - or would like to try it for the first time - this is an opportunity to relax in nature with no social taboos. I really enjoyed exploring this last year and it was amazing to be in a space where the usual restraints could be let go of, people naked mixing with those who were fully dressed in an atmosphere of openness and celebration. That said, if you prefer to stay well dressed there is no compulsion to be naked or attend any of the nude events, you create your personal programme over the five days. What is so great about the event is that it is a space where it is possible to be who you wish to be.

There are a number of cafes on the site so you can buy food, or bring your own to cook.

Workshops will range from Yoga, to sacred sexuality, healing and dance, discussions, activism and theatre. There is a more detailed list of events at the end of this email.

There will also be plenty of time to enjoy the beautiful nature all around us at the venue, to sit around a fire, to spend time talking with friends or reading on your own.

Last year was a really fun and unique experience, I hope you will be able to join us again this year to make it even more amazing.

5 day/weekend/concession tickets all available at: https://www.queerspirit.net/festival/tickets/

MORE VOLUNTEERS NEEDED TOO!

There are still volunteer roles up for grabs: Stewards, Welfare, Cafe Crews and Box Office.

FREE TICKET TO THE FESTIVAL IN RETURN FOR A FEW HOURS WORK.

If you are interested in volunteering:
https://www.queerspirit.net/festival/festival-team

Events List for Queer Spirit Festival 2017

Spiritual Practice

Yoga, Pilates, Tai Chi, Meditation and Kung Fu!

Practice facilitators include Quishi Dominusj (Pilates), Andy Butterfield (Yoganu) and Nick Kientsch (Gay and Bi Men's Mindfulness class in Covent Garden)

Dance, Movement and Theatre

Naked Movement with Calu Lema, Drag up the Bollywood with Kali Chandresegam, Embodied Moves with Sonalle LaMariposa.

Plus Musical Theatre, Playback Theatre, Radical Ballet, and Ecstatic Dance.

Spirit Mysteries

Walk the Labyrinth, Connect with Source, Mediumship, 5^th dimension, Native American Pipe Ceremonies, Ancestral Lineage

Spirit Mysteries facilitators include Lindsay River, Mountaine Jonas, Geoffrey Henning, Helen Moore and Stewart Lane.

Pagan Nature

Drum Practice and Trance Dance with Lou Hart and Andy Fowler, Goddess Inanna with Lindsay River, Shamanic Journeys led by DK Green.

Nature Meditation with Tom Cowan, Astrodrama with Hazel Birch.

The Intersections of Transness, Magic, Herbalism and Art with Chryssy Hunter and Jeanne Devlin.

Sacred Sexuality

Workshops in the Sacred Sexuality Temple range from Conscious Speed Dating to Spiritual BDSM, via Pagan Sex Magic, Bonobo Birthing, Radical Self-Care, Eco-Sexuality, Massage, Sacred Intimacy and more.

Also featuring the Sensual Jam, Queer Love Rites and early morning Love Lounge!

Connecting and Sharing

Heart Circles, Conscious Connection, Story Circle, Trans Support Meeting, Discussions.

Health and Healing

Gong Baths with Kamran Sarwar, Earth Medicine with Justin Luria, Hermit Practice with Tessa Wills.

Chinese Medicine with Titta Lalaala, Beginner's Guide to Veganism with Edward Daniel, Optimal Nutrition with Paz Banks.

Shiatsu with Andy Butterfield, Hypnosis with Hazel Birch. Healing Garden with practitioners offering their services also.

Creative Crafts

Make your own Spirit Doll with Rosie Green

Explore Natural Dye Block Printing and Shibori Wall Hangings with Prince Lydia.

To explore the different workshops and events on offer in more detail click here

Queer Spirit Festival is a not-for-profit, community event, run by volunteers.

DANCE OUT LOUD - is a gay community focused group that is mixed and open to both gay and non-gay people who love to dance...

The 5 Rhythms can be seen as a dance workout, a social event or a deep spiritual practice when you get into it. People come to see this movement practice more as a meditation and a therapeutic meeting without words. It can be fun, profound, silly, serious and playful.

Friday, 7 - 9.30pm
Venue: Central YMCA
Tube: Tottenham Court Road

Click here for more info

Open Connections
Sexuality Workshop for Gay/bi Men

Next meeting : 16 May 2017 - 'Non-sober' sex

Whether it's sex after a couple of drinks, a spliff, other drugs or chemsex, 'non-sober sex' can sometimes be a lot of fun, and often satisfies our transgressive urges and our fantasies to be sexual in an uninhibited way.

But things get problematic when we can only be sexual, or engage with others sexually, by being drunk or high.

The purpose of this workshop is to explore how we each relate to alcohol or drugs in our sexual lives, and what is uncomfortable about the sexual encounter that sometimes makes us prefer not being fully present.

Time: 8 - 9.30pm
Venue: Kobi Nazrul Centre, 30 Hanbury St, London E1 6QR
Cost: £20 (£10 concession)

Future meetings:

30 May 2017 - Sex in a relationship

13 June 2017 - Limits and pleasure

27 June 2017 - Distance in intimacy

This is not something I am organising but I am participating in it and it gives an opportunity to have a more detailed discussion about subjects than we have time for in the class. To reserve you place please click on the link above.

Open Connection is a space where gay/bi men can experiment with connecting in more open and authentic ways. Every month we will be discussing a topic that relates generally to men (around the themes of sex/ sexuality/ physicality/ intimacy). The hope is that through personal sharing we can deepen self insight, and learn from each other's similarities and differences.

What to expect? Expect to meet a group of interesting men in a relaxed, non-posturing setting. Most of the time at the gatherings will be allocated to a free group discussion, where everyone is encouraged to share from personal experience - there is however no pressure to share or reveal anything. Sometimes, depending on the topic we carry out some experiential exercises.

What not to expect? This is not a debating society, and so we're staying away from discussing intellectual theories. This is also not group therapy. Although a lot of topics will evoke strong emotions, and we encourage everyone to be supportive of each other, this won't be the place to therapise, change or 'fix' any one.

Open Connections: the founder describes the purpose of the workshops

For more details click here

We provide personal development events and resources for gay and bi men to meet each other on a deeper level and experience a stronger sense of community.

We call our events 'adventures in intimacy' because they give you opportunities to get intimate, try out new things, make connections, step outside of your comfort zone and probably laugh harder than you have for a long time. We hope you find our events supportive, challenging, stimulating and inspiring. Thatâ€™s all part of the adventure.

We welcome gay and bi men from all walks of life who want to develop their capacity to love other men. Reflecting our own diversity as a group of facilitators, we particularly encourage participation from black and ethnic minority men, HIV positive and negative men, young and older men, trans men and disabled men.

For more details click here

The Thrive Foundation was created to improve the mental, emotional and physical health and wellbeing of people of all ages, backgrounds, genders and races living with HIV.

For more details click here

Book Shop

Sane New World

Ruby Wax - comedian, writer and mental health campaigner - shows us how our minds can jeopardize our sanity.

With her own periods of depression and now a Masters from Oxford in Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy to draw from, she explains how our busy, chattering, self-critical thoughts drive us to anxiety and stress.

If we are to break the cycle, we need to understand how our brains work, rewire our thinking and find calm in a frenetic world.

Helping you become the master, not the slave, of your mind, here is the manual to saner living.

Click here to buy

Marrying the findings of the new field of social neuroscience together with gripping human stories, award-winning author and psychologist Susan Pinker explores the impact of face-to-face contact from cradle to grave, from city to Sardinian mountain village, from classroom to workplace, from love to marriage to divorce. Her results are enlightening and enlivening, and they challenge our assumptions.

Most of us have left the literal village behind, and don't want to give up our new technologies to go back there. But, as Pinker writes so compellingly, we need close social bonds and uninterrupted face-time with our friends and families in order to thrive - even to survive. Creating our own 'village effect' can make us happier. It can also save our lives.

To buy click here

The Chimp Paradox

Do you sabotage your own happiness and success? Are you struggling to make sense of yourself? Do your emotions sometimes dictate your life?

The Chimp Paradox is an incredibly powerful mind management model that can help you become a happy, confident, healthier and more successful person. Prof Steve Peters explains the struggle that takes place within your mind and then shows how to apply this understanding to every area of your life so you can:

- Recognise how your mind is working
- Understand and manage your emotions and thoughts
- Manage yourself and become the person you would like to be

The Chimp Mind Management Model is based on scientific facts and principles, which have been simplified into a workable model for easy use. It will help you to develop yourself and give you the skills, for example, to remove anxiety, have confidence and choose your emotions. The book will do this by giving you an understanding of the way in which your mind works and how you can manage it. It will also help you to identify what is holding you back or preventing you from having a happier and more successful life.

Each chapter explains different aspects of how you function and highlights key facts for you to understand. There are also exercises for you to work with. By undertaking these exercises you will see immediate improvements in your daily living and, over time, you will develop emotional skills and practical habits that will help you to become the person that you want to be, and live the life that you want to live.

Click here to buy

Food for the Heart

Chah offers a thorough exploration of Theravadan Buddhism in a gentle, sometimes humorous, style that makes the reader feel as though he or she is being entertained by a story. He emphasizes the path to freedom from emotional and psychological suffering and provides insight into the fact that taking ourselves seriously causes unnecessary hardship.

Click here to buy

Being Dharma

Renowned for the beauty and simplicity of his teachings, Ajahn Chah was Thailand's best-known meditation teacher. His charisma and wisdom influenced many American and European seekers, and helped shape the American Vipassana community. This collection brings together for the first time Ajahn Chah's most powerful teachings, including those on meditation, liberation from suffering, calming the mind, enlightenment and the 'living dhamma'. Most of these talks have previously only been available in limited, private editions and the publication of Food for the Heart therefore represents a momentous occasion: the hugely increased accessibility of his words and wisdom. Western teachers such as Ram Dass and Jack Kornfield have extolled Chah's teachings for years and now readers can experience them directly in this book.

Click here to buy

The Way It Is

A selection of talks by Ajahn Sumedho, an American disciple of Ajahn Chah. Simple, direct and inviting the reader to let go into a deeper experience of presence.

Click here to buy

The Four Noble Truths

A selection of talks by Ajahn Sumedho outlining the core Buddhist teaching of suffering, its cause, the cessation of suffering and the path leading to the cessation of suffering.

Click here to buy

A Little Gay History

How old is the oldest chat- up line between men? Who was the first ‘lesbian’? Were ancient Greek men who had sex together necessarily ‘gay’? And what did Shakespeare think about cross- dressing?

A Little Gay History takes objects ranging from Ancient Egyptian papyri and the erotic scenes on the Roman Warren Cup to images by modern artists including David Hockney and Bhupen Khakhar to consider questions such as these. Explored are the issues behind forty artefacts from ancient times to the present, and from cultures across the world, to ask a question that concerns us all: how easily can we recognize love in history?

Click here to buy

Straight Jacket

Written by Matthew Todd, editor of Attitude, the UK's best-selling gay magazine, Straight Jacket is a revolutionary clarion call for gay men, the wider LGBT community, their friends and family. Part memoir, part ground-breaking polemic, it looks beneath the shiny facade of contemporary gay culture and asks if gay people are as happy as they could be – and if not, why not?

In an attempt to find the answers to this and many other difficult questions, Matthew Todd explores why statistics show a disproportionate number of gay people suffer from mental health problems, including anxiety, depression, addiction, suicidal thoughts and behaviour, and why significant numbers experience difficulty in sustaining meaningful relationships. Bracingly honest, and drawing on his own experience, he breaks the silence surrounding a number of painful issues
To buy click here

Velvet Rage

Today's gay man enjoys unprecedented, hard-won social acceptance. Despite this victory, however, serious problems still exist. Substance abuse, depression, suicide, and sex addiction among gay men are at an all-time high, causing many to ask, "Are we really better off?"

Drawing on contemporary research, psychologist Alan Downs's own struggle with shame and anger, and stories from his patients, The Velvet Rage passionately describes the stages of a gay man's journey out of shame and offers practical and inspired strategies to stop the cycle of avoidance and self-defeating behavior. Updated to reflect the effects of the many recent social, cultural, and political changes, The Velvet Rage is an empowering book that has already changed the public discourse on gay culture and helped shape the identity of an entire generation of gay men.
To buy click here

Drop in class (open to anyone) 6.15-7.20pm (£8/ £5 concessions)

Gay and bi men's group

Time: 7.30-9.30pm

Fee: £10

Concessions: £5

Venue: Friends Meeting House, 8 Hop Gardens, off St Martins Lane.

Look for the large glass and concrete building with Gym Box on the corner, Hop Gardens is a pedestrian lane to the side of Gym Box.

Map

Meets every Monday except Bank Holidays.