Time Is a Lie Unless You Make It Count
What Back to the Future, About Time, and The Time Traveler’s Wife teach us about real time management.
We live by Kronos. We dream in Kairos.
That’s the tension we all feel but rarely name. Kronos is clock time—quantifiable, scheduled, relentless. It's the world of deadlines, calendars, and checklists. Kairos is something else entirely—sacred time, the opportune moment, the feeling of being exactly where you need to be, doing what only you can do.
Most of us spend our days drowning in Kronos, trying to “make time,” as if we can outpace the ticking clock. But we don’t need to make time. We need to notice it. Because the truth is: time only matters when it means something. And if we don’t fight to protect that meaning, we wake up busy… but empty.
This isn’t a productivity tip. This is about your life.
Back to the Future: The Mechanics of Kronos
Marty McFly has 1.21 gigawatts of energy, a DeLorean, and exactly one shot to hit 88 miles per hour before the lightning strikes the clock tower at 10:04 p.m.
This is Kronos in cinematic form: sequence, urgency, logistics, control. Everything in Back to the Future hinges on precise timing. It’s exhilarating. But it’s also exhausting. It’s what happens when every minute is accounted for, but none of it reflects what really matters.
We all become Doc Brown at some point—white-haired, wide-eyed, yelling about deadlines and contingency plans. But here’s the question the movie doesn't ask: Once you’ve mastered time, what are you going to do with it?
About Time: The Magic of Kairos
In About Time, Tim learns he can relive any moment in his life. At first, he uses this power to fix awkward situations, but eventually, he realizes something deeper: the goal isn’t to change the moment. The goal is to fully experience it.
He begins to live each day twice. The second time, he doesn’t change a thing—he just notices. The smile of a stranger. The rhythm of the rain. The way his father looks at him.
This is Kairos. It’s not about control. It’s about presence. It’s not measured in hours—it’s measured in meaning. You’ve felt it before: losing yourself in a conversation, the quiet relief after a decision, the last few minutes of daylight that make you pause without knowing why.
You don’t have to be a time traveler to access Kairos. You just have to pay attention.
The Time Traveler’s Wife: The Cost of Ignoring Time
Then there’s The Time Traveler’s Wife, where Henry is constantly pulled out of the present. He has no control over where or when he goes. He disappears from dinner tables, hospital rooms, from his own life. He tries to anchor himself with love, but he can’t stay.
This is what happens when we ignore both Kronos and Kairos—when we refuse to structure our time and forget to live inside of it. We become disoriented. Scattered. Haunted by the feeling that we’re always missing something.
It’s not the time jumps that break Henry. It’s that he can’t choose where to be when it matters most.
How often do we do the same?
Your Time Is a Compass, Not a Clock
I used to think better time management meant optimizing the clock. But the clock isn’t the problem. The real issue is forgetting what time is for.
I’ve started scheduling Kairos into my Kronos. I block off time for the things that make me feel alive: writing, calling someone I miss, sitting still. I protect it like a meeting. Because it is one—between me and the person I’m trying to become.
Here's what I’ve learned: When I honor Kairos, Kronos becomes less of a tyrant. My days don’t feel so claustrophobic. My work has more texture. My goals feel more like purpose and less like performance.
So ask yourself: What’s one moment you missed this week—not because you didn’t have time, but because you didn’t take it? What would it look like to live that moment fully next time?
Time doesn’t care how busy you are. But it will remember whether you showed up.