We feel pressured and anxious when we think about a future time when a project is due. This pressure and anxiety occur because over years we have developed a habitual way of looking at the future, a way that can be called the 'pressure perspective': we occupy a point in time we call 'the present', and we look from this point to a somewhat distant segment of time called 'the future', which contains the time that is relentlessly closing in on us here in the present with a speed that seems unchangeable. In other words, "First we pick out a point situated 'up ahead' in time, then we measure the distance to that point, then we react to this situated point." (p. 93, Dynamics of Time and Space) (There are innumerable other perspectives: read, for example, about the experience of time during peak experiences in "The Qualities of Deadline Pressure Scenarios.")
What if we tried to loosen up this rigid way of looking forward to things by viewing from the future back? Would that relieve some of the pressure and anxiety? Try it and find out! Following are descriptions for three ways this exercise can be done:
Reversing Temporal Structure
Try a different way of looking at the rest of the project. Suppose it's the day after the deadline (or some arbitrary future day): don't just pretend, but as much as you can, get into the sense that it is that day. Now look back over 'the past' and make a few notes about what happened on the project up till this day. Write your notes in the past tense, as if whatever comes to mind really did happen in the past, and you're just remembering it.
How does looking back after the past events feel? Does it relieve the pressure, anxiety, and sense of urgency that you felt before? Do you get any insight about unexpected directions that the project took?
Following is a more detailed description of this technique that can also be used for general planning purposes, or as an antidote for procrastination:
The exercise presented here is from Appendix A of Results in No Time, and is a variant of Exercise 20, "Reversing Temporal Structure," pp. 175-6, in Time, Space, and Knowledge (Tarthang Tulku, Dharma Publishing, 1977). There's a similar exercise called the presumé in Get It All Done and Still Be Human, by Tony and Robbie Fanning (New York: Ballantine Books, 1979).
Setting Up the Exercise
This exercise can turn your usual temporal perspective around and allow more of the timelessness of peak performance to shine through. What you'll do first is to pick the most important project that you're currently working on--or procrastinating about. Or if deadline pressure is bothering you, pick a project for which you're feeling considerable pressure. Second, you'll assume that it's some particular time in the future, for example, a month from now, and then you'll write down in past tense whatever comes to mind about what happend on the project during the past month. Actually you can choose any future date and substitute that for "one month from today" in these instructions. If you're working with a project on a deadline, you could pick some time shortly after the deadline.
So first identify the project that will be most important in your life during the next month. Or pick a project you've been procrastinating about, or a project for which you have a deadline. Got one project in mind?
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Now set up your environment so you'll be undisturbed for twenty minutes. At the top of a piece of paper, write the date as if it were one month from today (or whatever other date you choose).
Then just as a reminder, write down a few words generally describing the project you've selected.
Everything else on the paper will be written in past tense, since you are recording what already happened. Keep an open mind, don't expect, hope, fear, or assume anything. Don't be optimistic or pessimistic.
Just relax and see whether you can 'remember' what happened on your project during the past month. You may not 'remember' right away--but we don't always remember things immediately when we try, do we?
Looking Back
Look back towards the past and write in past tense what you see. Write whatever you remember was accomplished, as well as any insight you realized and any personal changes you see that you went through.
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About Doing the Exercise
After you feel that the exercise is complete, take a few more minutes and write down how you experienced it. Did anything interesting happen? Did you get any insights or creative ideas? Did you enjoy doing the exercise? Did you get a sense of completion and satisfaction? Was it different from your typical way of planning or thinking about doing projects?
Other Ways To Do the Exercise
This exercise may be done with other time periods--like a week, three months, or a year--or you may simply assume it's a given date and look back from there.
Instead of making a daily "to-do list," you can effectively use this exercise to write a "done list" for the day.
Rather than have to switch back and forth between writing and remembering what happened, you may prefer to use a tape recorder or dictate to a friend.
When doing the exercise you may get images or scenes which can be sketched and included with your writing.
And finally, if after doing the exercise you do not find the results you anticipated, you can do it again from a point of view further in the future.
About Changing Perspective
You may get a sense of relief, peace, presence, or rest--even if the project didn't appear to be completed.
Why? Most of our lives seem to be spent trying to get to goals up ahead, in the future. We expect that we'll be happier later on, after we complete that project. But the quality of our experience--the natural fulfillment that is available no matter what we're doing--is depreciated by a habitual perspective of looking forward to things.
When we change our habitual perspective on time, we break through this temporal structure of seeking happiness somewhere else. Then instead of fighting against time, trying to get to our goals, we can just be here in peace and presence. We can, if only for a brief timelessness, be here instead of trying to get there.
The usual linear view of time (See Linear vs. Timeless Views), with its constant flow of time and efforts to seek satisfaction, is unnecessary, full of anxiety, and unhealthy. By doing exercises like this one we can eventually completely transform our sense of time passing.
Note: This exercise helps to dissolve the opaque boundary we experience between present and future. After working with it awhile, you can take this dismantling a step farther by practicing Exercises 20 and 21 from the book Time, Space, and Knowledge.
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