There are 23 hours 56min and 4 sec in a day and 365 days in a year (depending on whether one uses a Julian, Gregorian, Chinese or other version of calendar). Depending on where one lives, life expectancy can be quite varied ranging from 37.2 years in Zambia to an average high of 83.5 in Andorra. There are, of course the obvious and notable exceptions of infants that die shortly after birth and documented individuals who have lived to the exceptionally ripe old age of 122 plus some days (kudos to Jeanne Louise Calment of France).
Senescence is the state or process of aging. The word is derived from the Latin word senex, meaning "old man" or "old age." Cellular senescence is a phenomena where isolated cells demonstrate a limited ability to divide in culture. Organismal senescence is the aging of organisms. Organismal aging is generally characterized by the declining ability to respond to stress, increasing homeostatic imbalance and increased risk of disease. Because of this, death is the ultimate consequence of aging.
Different people have different lifestyles. But it appears that it matters most where in the world (rather than how) you live. Health care and hygiene seem to influence life expectancy more than any other factor.(http://www.cojoweb.com/100-years-old-and-more.html)
Human beings invented the concept of time as a measure to conduct their affairs and bring some sense of order to the world. Time, however, remains an abstraction. Given the length of life attainable by any one human being, there remains an inevitable and unbridgeable gap between current knowledge and understanding and that of previous generations. This trans-generational failure of the continuity of first-hand knowledge, experience and collective memory contributes directly to the unfortunate predilection of human beings suffering a continuous case of amnesia and repeating bad behaviors. To date, even the best chiseled, stamped, written, photographed, video and digitized media only give distant representations of previous events and experiences. Even these capsules of people, places and events, given the passage of enough generations, loses context, significance, and relativity to the point where much of the data left is suspect to deliberate misinformation, manipulation, exclusion, revisionism, pure metaphor, allegory and other writing devices that prove unreliable to subsequent generations.
Given the above introductions regarding life expectancy and the description of time, the loosely connected ideas come together at a point when one examines human activity. One of the most basic questions that every man, woman and child should ask numerous times through life is why do we do what we do and what do we hope to gain by it? This question should be asked on both a personal level and as a species level. If one is honest about seeking an answer and accepting the findings, then our individual and collective journeys might very well be different. From an early age we are taught to want and perceive needs for various objectives. These motivations are reinforced by friends, family and media influences that often we are hardly aware are present. Other times, these same motivations are re-enforced in painfully obvious and repetitive ways. While there are many insightful and meaningful directions that can be attained by asking these questions, one of them that takes on particular importance is the perception of having to rush through life. Anyone working in the 21st century experiences on a regular experience or has been subjected to constant and seemingly increasing demands to rush-rush-rush.
My question to anyone advocating this position is why? What good does it do to rush? To be sure, I do not debate the true medical emergency where life is on the line, or threat of imminent danger is present unless decisive action is taken; I am not sure I know of many individuals that would advocate any other position except in the most extreme of cynics wishing to exercise some sort of cost control over social classes. Rather my question involves taking what a more everyday tasks and turning them into the most corrosive and destructive of long term conditions for people. Take, for instance, a department store where merchandise has to be rushed to the floor constantly and everything perfected so that people can buy-buy-buy. In this commercial scenario, employees are penalized for being late, not working fast enough and making mistakes because they did not perfect the assigned task in the time allowed. Whose interests are truly being served in working faster and faster to push merchandise, to rush to work, to stretch the limits of the human mental ability to balance a well ordered thinking process and quality of life? From my point of view - only a very small minority of people benefit from such pressures.
Should it come as any surprise that people are working two and three jobs just to keep their head above the financial waters? Why? To keep pace with the accelerating cost of living? Sleep deprivation, record numbers of stress related disorders, violence, fragmenting family bonds, depression, and a host of other ailments that contribute to conditions that are inconsistent with healthy human mental and physical conditions.
The scope is enormous and would be quite time consuming to document but well worth thinking about. Instead of trying to prove my point through illustrating examples of work place unhappiness, unfulfilled dreams, lives and a sense of working for no other purpose than to pay bills and support the bottom line interests of a relatively small number of people, I would rather return to the principle question of why we do it? Why do we tolerate it? What are individuals afraid of in deciding that quality of life is more important than chasing quantity of numbers. Would you rather reject the office and daily hum drum of being half fulfilled in doing work that you despise or feel cornered into doing simply for the ability to buy something new? How much are those purchases large and small or sacrifices really worth? Is it sane to work 40 or more hours per week doing work you can't stand only to be laid off, dismissed or fall into bad health by the time you believe that you are beginning to see a point that you can start enjoying life? Or is it more sensible to find something that is less demanding on your time, health and mind so that the quality of your life improves and you have time to think, sleep, find diversions that stimulate you and enjoy the company of those around you?
For some the answer is that high pace, fast action, and pressure are a thrill and stimulus. The lure of wealth, power, prestige and control are a narcotic that are worth pursuing. This is not, however, for everyone and indeed our society seems to focus only on training people to win...win...win...be at the top, make as most as you can and get the best. Somewhere through our development as a species and in particular as a nation, the idea of being content with less in life, finding dignity in work that others might consider beneath or lowly took hold of the national conscience. This is a terrible state to be in. Because only a tiny fraction of people can ever be the best the majority...vast majority are continually pushed to a goal that is likely to be a failed ambition and a large source of continued unhappiness and disaffection throughout their lives.
I would advance the argument that it is more productive for people as individuals and or as partners to decide what are the true objectives in life. Give serious thought to what will lead to contentment, reduce the complexities to their basics and see through the veneer of corporate and business rewards, pressures and lures. Individuals may discover a new sense of liberation and untouchability that frees them of having to push so hard for no other reason than that they have been conditioned to believe that such a path is the only one. Understanding the pressures, subtleties, and ones own needs and sources of contentment does take an effort, but it is worth the careful and thoughtful process and may reduce the pressures of American life that tend to age us and wither us needlessly.
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