From Clockwork to Coherence
A Selftropic Time Shift
On any normal day, week, or weekend, I get up and head straight for coffee and a one-hour minimum of writing—or thinking and strategizing. It is my Optimum Time, and this is how I choose to use it. Since 2016, this early rhythm I protect each morning reminds me that Time is something I can claim.
Most of us think of Time as external, an endless ribbon of hours marching forward, unravelling our lives one second after another, clocks, calendars, and deadlines chiming everywhere. What if Time were something else entirely? I dare you to imagine that instead of a rigid structure, Time is something we can shape and inhabit with intention. In Selftropy, Time isn’t just a measurement—it’s an experience. And the day, not the week or the year, becomes our essential unit of wellbeing.
What’s wellbeing anyway?
Tossed around everywhere, the term becomes increasingly diluted. In the Selftropic model, wellbeing is simple. It is not a general feeling or an abstract ideal. It is a measurable, daily adjustable set of nine tangible capacities: mood, drive, energy, mental coherence, contentment, excitement, emotional stability, resilience, and attentiveness. That’s what Time in the Health Age should look like.
Selftropic Time maximizes these inherent capacities that we already have. Instead of drying ourselves out on the arms of a clock designed in the 19th century and prior, it is our Time, our life, our terms.
THE PROBLEM WITH MECHANICAL TIME
Mechanical Time measures space. Based on planetary rotation and uniform division—hours, minutes, seconds—it assumes every hour is equal. Since human beings are not machines, and our energy, clarity, and emotional states don’t follow such symmetry, it does not work. The health effects of mechanical Time—if used as the sole structure—are profound. Stress hormones like cortisol surge in rigid, overclocked routines. Sleep quality declines due to inconsistent circadian alignment. Mental fatigue increases, along with decision-paralysis and irritability. Chronobiology research shows that a mismatch between one’s internal body clock and external demands (so-called “social jetlag”) is linked to depression, poor immunity, and metabolic disorders.
Mechanical Time served us well in the age of industrialization. It synchronized people across factories, schools, and transport systems, allowing society to scale. In the 19th century, railway companies lobbied for standardized time zones because train crashes were increasing due to localized clocks. Mechanical Time brought coherence to chaos—but at a cost to human rhythm. Trains ran on a dizzying patchwork of “local times” until the industry standardized four zones in one day, then, in 1883, came the adoption of Standard Time in North America.
SELFTROPIC TIME
This mechanized view of Time erases nuance, forcing all tasks into the same temporal mold. When we must perform equally every day, we disconnect from our internal rhythms. Treating every hour as interchangeable leads to over-scheduling, burnout, and misaligned effort. Emotional tone shifts. Our day is not a flat line—it’s a series of curves. Selftropic Time maps those curves honoring the reality of our neurobiological and emotional cycles. Five temporal states form a new chronobiology:
· Optimum Time - periods when your cognitive clarity and task alignment match. These are ideal for strategic work.
· Accelerated Time - short bursts of high-energy, high-output performance. Best for execution, not ideation.
· Decelerated Time - when energy dips and recovery is essential. Instead of fighting it, we reframe it as restoration.
· Mood-Responsive Time - adapting your activities based on your emotional state. This creates congruence and reduces inner resistance.
· Sleep – the recovery time, the deep, passive restoration mode. This is a full-system recalibration that impacts memory, hormone regulation, emotional processing, and immune repair. I see sleep not as an end to the day but as its most intelligent investment. For the power-nappers out there: kudos!
In this model, the day becomes a sequence of stations, each with its own best use. Recognizing and responding to these stations boosts health, coherence, and productivity. You’ve likely experienced days when nothing worked, even though your schedule was clear. Or days when one hour felt more productive than ten. That’s not magic, it’s biology. Instead of trying to change your mood to match the task, you change the task to suit your mood—whenever possible. This micro-adjustment, done daily, leads to macro-changes in wellbeing.
Well... but not everything can be adjusted, and we’re all too familiar with the fact that some tasks are necessary and unappealing. Luckily, the selftropic model has a way to reframe them so they feel easier and even pleasurable. I’ll expand on that tactic in the upcoming Selftropy Book I, The Book of Chores. For now, know this: your resistance to certain tasks is a signal, not a flaw. Time, when used differently, can help you read such signals more wisely.
A LOOK AT THE PAST
In antiquity…
Chores were embedded in ritual—sweeping the courtyard, fermenting food, weaving—all were connected to life’s meaning and seasonal wisdom. Chores marked transitions: grinding grain signaled harvest’s end, spinning thread meant a family was preparing for winter. In Ancient Greece, care tasks were integral to civic and moral life. The term oikos—from which we get the word “economy”—meant more than just “household”; it referred to a system of interdependence among people, property, and rituals of care. Managing the oikos well wasn’t just a domestic concern; it was seen as a civic virtue, essential to sustaining the polis itself. In Eastern traditions, cleaning was a spiritual act. Buddhist monks still begin each day by sweeping the monastery grounds as a form of meditation, a quiet way to tame the soul.
Then there was a shift. Some historians argue that as societies became more hierarchical and power centralized—particularly under expanding religious institutions—everyday labor lost its symbolic value and became a tool for moral and economic control. The rise of Christian asceticism positioned suffering as virtuous, and manual labor, especially for the lower classes, was reframed as redemptive. Pleasure in work was seen as suspect.
The medieval era…
Distanced tasks from pleasure, associating labor with punishment and class. In feudal Europe, peasants labored under the church’s doctrine that suffering brought spiritual merit. Tasks were no longer life-affirming but obligatory and often exploitative. Nobility started to avoid “domestic work” and delegated it, severing itself from these daily acts entirely. This created a cultural split where chores stopped being spiritual or ritualistic. And so, as the world wars settled, chores became a gruesome, undervalued necessity, just in Time for the rise of the middle class.
By the 1950s…
Machines promised freedom: the dishwasher, the vacuum, the laundry spinner. Yet each solution birthed more expectations, new chores, and rising time scarcity. “Labor-saving” devices didn’t erase work—they reorganized it into new rituals of perfection and productivity. Betty Friedan, in The Feminine Mystique, warned that this mechanization created an “ache of emptiness” as women were isolated inside routines that looked efficient but felt hollow.
In the 1980s and 90s…
Hollywood began romanticizing Time Lost and found—like in Groundhog Day or Dead Poets Society. More recently, actor Hugh Jackman shared in an interview with Time magazine that his morning ritual of making coffee “grounds [him] more than any meditation app.” Even billionaires now post about their 5 a.m. chore rituals—watering plants, folding laundry, walking their dog. Maybe reclaiming Time’s intimacy is the new luxury.
Now, we’re surrounded by a sea of apps, automations, and gig services, yet we still feel behind. Time has never been more optimized, yet never more out of reach. Wouldn’t it be something to finally merge wisdom and efficiency? A system that brings rhythm back to routine, and mental ease to every day?
References
1. Roenneberg, Till, et al. “Social Jetlag and Obesity.” Current Biology, vol. 22, no. 10, 2012, pp. 939–943
2. Brown, Peter. The Rise of Western Christendom: Triumph and Diversity, A.D. 200–1000. Wiley-Blackwell, 2003
