How Does a Moment Last Forever?
“Last 30 seconds!” Terrible news to hear if you’re doing a plank. Still, you hold it. You persevere. It’s probably been 15 seconds already, right? You check the timer—23 seconds remain. Oh dear. A 15-minute recess break is like nothing, so why on earth do these 15 seconds feel so long?
Well, don’t worry—you’re not crazy or making excuses. There is an actual, neurological reason why some moments last forever, while others slip away in the blink of an eye.
An important concept to understand is that the brain does not perceive time in the same way that a clock tracks it. Instead of counting seconds, minutes, and hours, the brain creates its perception of time based on how much information it has to process and how much attention you are paying to time.
This is based on the Scalar Expectancy Theory (SET), which is currently the most accepted and widely researched framework for time perception. According to the SET, the brain perceives time through a ‘pacemaker,’ which produces pulses, and an ‘accumulator,’ which records the pulses when attention is directed to the passing time.
The pacemaker-accumulator mechanism explains why those last 10 seconds of a plank feel like an eternity, or why exercise in general feels so long.
During exercise, your body feels as though it is in danger. In response, it activates “fight-or-flight” mode. You have probably noticed your heart pounding and your breathing getting harsher; those are signs of your body trying to keep you safe. There are also many changes beyond the obvious ones. For example, the body also sends a flood of signals to your brain that act as constant updates to maximize your chances of survival.
The flood of signals accelerates the pacemaker, causing it to send more pulses than usual. Essentially, because your brain is processing so much more information per second, the seconds simply feel longer.
Of course, the brain is not just trying to make staying healthy feel like torture—this does have a practical use. If you have ever been in a situation that felt life-threatening (like falling down the stairs), you may have felt as though time slowed down. A fall that should have only taken a second feels like a minute, and you have time to notice everything that might help you save yourself. This is also a result of your body sending a flood of information (in the form of signals) to your brain. If you are reading this, your body and brain have succeeded in saving you from whatever stupid situations you have gotten yourself into. Congratulations!
Going back to the accumulator, another one of its traits is that it does a better job of recording pulses when you pay more attention to time, creating the feeling of time dragging on. The more you think about those last five seconds of exercise, the longer they will feel. The same applies to those last 15 minutes of your last class of the day. Wishing it would end quicker actually just makes it seem longer.
On the opposite side of the spectrum, time flies when you are having fun simply because you are not paying attention to time. The signals of the pacemaker do not matter if the accumulator is not counting them. After all, who cares about the time when you have weeks’ or months’ worth of drama to unravel?
The brain does not naturally track time (aside from the Circadian rhythm, which regulates when you sleep), so it doesn’t bother with tracking unless it needs to. If you aren’t in danger or actively paying attention to the time, the brain generally does not care and directs its focus to other things.
So, in theory, it is possible to gaslight yourself into making time pass by a little faster during exercise by thinking about other things. But make sure to enjoy the times when you are having fun because, unfortunately, moments don’t actually last forever.
Sources:
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4830363/
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10983804/
https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1988-09671-001
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0023969001911051
https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/time-passage
