Sculpting Project18: My Mind in Time: Week 1

**Sculpting Project18: My Mind in Time Week 1**

How we orient to time makes a big difference in how we live our lives. Philip Zimbardo (most known for his psychological studies at Stanford) and John Boyd have identified 7 primary ways we orient to time. Here is a quick test I created to help you find your primary orientation/s. Select statements that seem most characteristic of you. You are looking for 2-5 that are the closest to your views. (If a question doesn’t work for you, adjust it, but keep the basic theme.)

It gives me pleasure to think about my past. (PP)
I do things impulsively.(PHED)
I try to not regret yesterday or worry about tomorrow, but I pay attention to the now.(PHOL)
I believe that a person’s day should be planned each morning. (F)
I often think I should have done things differently.(PN)
Since ‘what ever will be will be’ it doesn’t matter much what I do. (PF)
Death is just a new beginning. (FT)
When I want to achieve something I set goals and figure out a way to reach them.(F)
Only my physical body will ever die. (FT)
Childhood memories are pleasant. (PP)
I like the motto: ‘If it feels good, do it.’ (PHED)
Fate determines most of my life. (PF)
I make efforts to notice of the little moments of life. (PHOL)
Painful past experiences keep replaying in my mind. (PN)

Now list the letters in parenthesis that you checked and see which one of the 7 orientations you tend toward.____________________________________________

7 Ways to Orient Towards Time

(PP) Past positive
(PN) Past negative
(PHED) Present hedonist
(PF) Present fatalist
(PHOL) Present holistic
(F) Future
(FT) Future transcendental

Our time orientations make a big difference in how we choose to live our days. Some of our orientations begin when we are very young. Zimbardo’s Marshmallow Study was done with 4 year-olds. This study examined the differences between PHED children and F children. 4 year-olds were offered the choice of one marshmallow right now or two marshmallows if they wait several minutes. The children who could wait were future oriented and the ones who could not wait were present hedonist. The children were checked-on again when they reached their high school years. The difference between the F and PHED students was startling. Read on next week for this amazing finding (or you can check online. There are ‘really cute’ films of the actual 4 year-old study.) Even though our orientations begin when we are young we have the ability to change our time orientation. This is good news because some orientations are more helpful than others. More on this next week.