Is Time Really Flying?
Why time speeds up as we age and how to slow it down with brain-backed strategies
Every year right before Christmas rolls in I think: It’s Christmas, again. How did we get there? Where did the year go?
You blink, and somehow spring, summer, and fall have come and gone, the clocks have changed, and your winter boots are glaring at you from the back of the wardrobe.
If you’re over 40, you might feel like the years are accelerating. But it’s not a flaw in your character or your calendar. It’s a shift in how your brain perceives time.
And yes, neuroscience offers some answers. So keep reading.
Why Time Felt Slower When You Were Younger
Remember how long summer holidays felt when you were a child? Weeks stretched out like an endless ribbon. A single afternoon could feel like a full experience. Time was generous. Spacious.
That’s partly because everything was new. New places, new people, new skills. Novelty lights up the brain. It forces your neural networks to encode more detailed information. When the brain is busy processing novel input, it marks time more finely. That leads to a richer memory trail and the perception that time moves more slowly.
Children’s brains are constantly laying down new neural pathways. They don’t yet have a mental shortcut for “going to the dentist” or “having an argument with a friend.” Every experience gets a unique mental tag. It’s fresh. It’s vivid. It sticks.
As adults? We fast-track.
We’ve done this before. And the brain, always looking to conserve energy, leans into predictive coding, using previous experience to fill in the blanks. This works beautifully for efficiency… and not so well for our sense of time.
If you drive to work the same way every day, your brain may encode it only once, even if you do it 200 times. The memory feels thinner. Time feels faster thanks to the force of habit.
What Happens in the Ageing Brain?
Beyond lifestyle and routine, there’s a biological reason for this shift.
Your medial temporal lobe, particularly the hippocampus, is key for memory and time perception. As we age, this area undergoes structural and functional changes, including a decrease in grey matter volume and a reduced ability to process new information with the same fidelity.
In practical terms?
Your brain’s internal stopwatch becomes more relaxed. You’re less sensitive to temporal cues, the signals your brain uses to gauge how much time has passed.
Couple this with a more routinised life (job, caretaking responsibilities, financial worries, digital overwhelm) and you’ve got the perfect conditions for time to fly by unnoticed.
Less novelty + hippocampal changes + predictive coding = faster subjective time.
It’s not your imagination. It’s your biology.
Why This Matters for Women in Midlife
The women I work with — educated, often living on their own in urban environments, many navigating perimenopause or menopause — aren’t just worried about time slipping by. They’re feeling left out of it. Invisibility. Unmet expectations. Shifting relationships. The sense that life is shrinking, not expanding.
When time speeds up, it can reinforce that feeling of irrelevance. Days seem to blend together. Weeks disappear. And without realising it, women who once felt vibrant and curious can find themselves stuck in a loop of grey repetition, even while doing “all the right things.”
This isn’t just frustrating. It has consequences.
Because novelty and engagement aren’t just about making life more fun. They’re essential for brain health, emotional regulation, and cognitive resilience.
In fact, studies show that introducing novelty and challenge into daily life can increase neuroplasticity, boost dopamine levels, and improve executive function, the very skills that help us feel sharp, confident, and in control.
How to Slow Time Without Winding Back the Clock
The encouraging part? This process is hackable.
You don’t need to go skydiving or move to Bali (unless that’s your thing). You just need to break the monotony. Interrupt your pattern to wake up your brain.
Here’s how:
Inject Novelty
Take a different route to the supermarket or work. Rearrange your furniture. Try a new workout. Watch a film you’ve never seen before. Shake things up. Even small changes can jolt the brain into attention mode.
Learn Something New
Novelty doesn’t have to be external. Mental stimulation, like learning a language, exploring a creative skill, or tackling a challenging read, can reignite neural activity.
Choose Presence
Multitasking kills memory. And we suck at it anyway. When you’re doing five things at once, none of them gets done or stored properly. Try monotasking. Try stillness. Try noticing. Be present.
Travel Lightly But Often
You don’t need a grand tour. Even a day trip or a new neighbourhood walk can dislodge the mental sediment. If you have a dog, they’ll love it too! New sights, new smells, it works for humans and furry friends.
Say Yes to (Slightly) Scary Things
Not terrifying. Not unsafe. Just… unknown. A dance class. A new social circle. Hosting a birthday party when you’d rather hide (hello, fellow introverts). Growth lives in that edge.
Ageing in Power Means Curating Time, Not Just Filling It
This isn’t about productivity. It’s about deliberate design.
Midlife is not a winding down. It’s a deepening. But to make that depth feel real, you need markers. Milestones. New memory points.
Because it’s not just how long you live, it’s how deeply you experience the life you’re living.
And the great irony?
The more you slow time down, the more life you actually feel.
What If Time Isn’t the Problem?
Maybe time isn’t the enemy.
Maybe it’s just the mirror.
Reflecting whether you’re living by habit… or by design.
If the days are starting to blur, don’t panic.
Pause. Re-engage. Shake the snow globe.
Time expands for those who pay attention.
Want to make your brain your ally in midlife and beyond?
Subscribe to Shenmag for knowledge, insights, and tips on brain health, lifestyle design, and ageing in power — written for smart, curious readers who want to shape their Third Act with intention.
If you liked this post, support Shenmag:
→ If this sparked something in you, give this post a like.
→ If you have a thought to share or just want to chime in, leave a comment.
→ And if it made you rethink something and you want to spread the word, restack.
Shenmag is more than a newsletter. It’s a conversation about ageing on our own terms. Every interaction helps it grow. Let’s rethink midlife. Redefine ageing. And rewrite what comes next.
I've been waiting for this article since you mentioned it in a Note! I've been able to keep it fresh in my mind as a to-do (yay for me!). When I was younger, I wanted life to speed up so that I could be an adult. Now that I am an adult (and have been for some time), I just want it to slow down a bit. Thanks for providing tips that can help make that happen. ~ Shelby
Wow! Maybe it seems I’m doing something right for a change. I love how you synthesized these ideas and I can’t wait to share more with you, but I am in fact, a new ballroom dancer, and I work out regularly, changing my routines and workouts often. I like to go on new walks and hikes and make new recipes frequently and I’ve always wondered why. Often it seems it’s my ADHD that’s craving novelty, but this is very complementary to that assumption and helps. Looking forward to more novelty and more learning as I soak in my 50s.