5 Reasons to Take One Daylight Savings Step Forward and Two Backwards

Does Daylight Savings Time make you tired?  Does time or the lack of it get you stressed?  Does the pressure to do more with less overwhelm you?  Do you find yourself chasing time you can never get back?

It doesn’t do any good to let time get the best of you.  But if it does, and you’re seeking relief from losing an hour of sleep tonight, you are in the right place.  We’ll give you some distraction to make better use of your time – except for the hour you will be giving up if Daylight Savings Time is implemented where you live.

Since you won’t have time to catch up on that lost time, The Vintage Vixen is encouraging you to take time today to step back, reflect and do something fun – just for you.

I did that last weekend.  I improvised an outing to embrace the era of my rights of passage through music and friendship.  If you’re reading my work for the first time, the following might appear to come out of nowhere.  I’m simply taking time to say “Thank You” to my community members for supporting me and my dream.  I also believe people on my email list deserve my time and support.  Plus, they’re all really cool people.

I spent an afternoon laughing, chatting and hanging with actor Steve Peterson and textile artist Sumi Foley.  You can check their profiles in the Community Leveling UP and Community Spotlight sections of this website.  Ditto for musician John York, who has performed with The Byrds and a bunch of other famous name-brand musicians.  John was performing in a small venue in Pasadena.  Here are a couple of examples of what fun looked like that day.

Some people like Daylight Savings Time.  Some people don’t.  People appear to be preoccupied with time although Albert Einstein once wrote:  “People like us who believe in physics know that the distinction between past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”

People often appear to be preoccupied with time.  They talk about it a lot.  Some like to talk about how little time they have.  Many are adamant about doing more work before time runs out.  Our perception of time can be a major stress factor – especially for overachievers with busy schedules.  It can be overwhelming.  When life gets in the way, some people feel inadequate.

If you get stressed, you could ask for a time warp.

Remember time is on your side.  And as you’re remembering, here are five reasons to approach Daylight Savings Time with one step forward and two backwards.

1.      It’s OK to take time for you.

Regardless of whether we turn our clocks forward tomorrow, people are still going to be people.  Many will still be in a hurry to get more done.  They will contend they don’t have time to stop and smell the coffee or tiptoe through tulips.  They contend they have too much to do and not enough time.

That prompted me to ask myself:  What never becomes outdated?  What should I dedicate more time to doing?  The answer is:  have more fun.  Turn work into fun.  How that looks changes each day.  And that’s OK.

I’d love to encourage each of you to give yourself an extra hour of sunshine all year around.  Take time to do whatever recharges your energy so you can share your internal light with the rest of us. 

I’m not suggesting you shun your responsibilities or take up a new hobby.  I’m just reminding you that most of you are high achievers, which makes you wonderful role models and leaders.  You’re also givers who give the world you and your talent because you’re driven to be you.

2.      Community involvement never goes out of style.

I asked a couple of workaholics why they didn’t schedule time for themselves.  They contended they want to boost their businesses by better serving their communities.  That’s admirable, but sometimes the best way to do that is by taking time to enjoy your tribe.  They’ll let you know what is important to them, but you have to listen.

A sense of community also is a great reminder of the oneness of humanity.  Knowing we’re not running the human race alone is comforting.

3.      Sometimes music is timeless.

After John York’s concert last weekend, Steve Peterson said the music brought back memories.  Some of those memories shaped his now.

“It was like a musical history of what my life was like in the 60s and early 70s,” Steve said.

He contended music that never gets old is a great way to reflect on the past.  Often that reflection leads us to clarity concerning what is or isn’t working in our lives today.  I believe it is because music and other forms of art amplify life.

I shared Steve’s sentiments because I was listening to music that influenced the orchestration of my youth.  It was even cooler to open the musical time capsule and hear the songs performed by a legendary musician who helped make those songs so wonderful that they became classics.

4.       Everything happens by divine timing.

The concept of setting our clocks forward in spring and backward in autumn was first introduced in 1784 by Benjamin Franklin.  That’s when he wrote an essay called “An Economical Project”, contending people could save a lot of money on candles if they changed their sleeping habits to accommodate the sun’s schedule.

It is all a reminder that taking time for you is not wasting time.  Despite how life shows up, time is on your side because life unfolds for our greatest good, and it does so according to divine timing.  While time slips away in the flickering candlelight, the universe finds time for everything.  Here’s a YouTube video of John York singing about divine timing.

5.      Congress and / or cows don’t care.

In 2018, California voters took their time to the polls.  They approved Proposition 7 which granted the State Assembly the right to make it Daylight Savings time every day of the year.  It hasn’t happened yet and might not because the federal government has to give the state permission.  The feds are busy with issues such as inflation and war.  They don’t care if we lose an hour of beauty sleep each spring.

My aunt told me Daylight Savings Time was established to give farmers more light to till the land and tend to the animals.  I recently learned many farmers were opposed to the change.  It seems their cows refused to get up for morning milking until the sun motivated them to start their day.