Chronos/Kairos – A Powerful Mental Model of Time

Whenever you learn a new word or concept, it can change the way you view the world. Often it also adds a useful tool you can use to navigate life differently. For instance, the 80/20 Rule (aka Pareto Principle) can help you look for key things and actions that really produce results and as a consequence let go of the small stuff. The concept of Antifragility might change your view of volatility and risk – how to live with uncertainty and how to not only survive, but rather gain from shocks to the system. “Black swan” is another term that neatly summarizes a larger concept and can provide a clear mental image for a (complex) chain of events.

Recently, I’ve reflected a lot on a set of terms that have their origins in Greek mythology: the chronos/kairos distinction. Apparently, the greek had two words for time: chronos and kairos.

• chronos: linear, sequential time
• kairos: numinous, qualitative time

Origins in Greek Mythology

Before going into the actual differences and some ideas on how to experiment with chronos/kairos, let’s briefly dive into the fascinating world of Greek mythology to get some additional background information.

Greek mythology is rather rich and colorful. Ancient Greek Gods like Zeus, Aphrodite, Apollo, Poseidon etc. come to mind. All of them had their own sphere of influence as well as characteristic traits. For example, Zeus the ruler of Mount Olympus wielded his signature thunderbolt and was considered not only wise, just and prudent, but also easily angered. Especially famous are his many affairs with various nymphs and even mortals that he consummated through his rather creative transformations and incarnations: swan, ant, bull, golden shower?!?

Half-gods like Heracles (aka Hercules) and Achilles live on in proverbs like “Herculean effort” or “Achilles’ heel”. Human heroes like tricky Odysseus and his adventures as described by Homer in the Iliad and especially the Odyssey are also familiar to most.

Chronos/Cronus Ambiguity

Initially, Chronos was the personification of time. Think of an old, wise man with a long, grey beard, similar to Father Time. Then there was the Titan Cronus who ruled the cosmos. In order to protect his rule, he had the habit of devouring his children. Finally, his wife Rhea got tired of that and hid the latest male offspring (Zeus) right after birth. She tricked Cronus into eating a rock instead. When Zeus grew up and was strong enough, he led a victorious revolt against his father Cronus and became the new ruler of the Universe.

Things get somewhat messy and ambiguous due to the fact that the Romans imported a ton of the Greek Gods and made them their own – like Jupiter, Venus or Saturn. Especially from the Renaissance onwards, lots of artists took inspiration from the colorful history and themes the Graeco-Roman mythology offered and combined and merged subjects together like in the case of Chronos and Cronus.

Why Is It Important to Know This Particular Lens?

Now what’s the point of all this? Who cares about the old Greek Gods anyways – and so what if there are two different words for time? Time is time and that’s it. Moments are special whether there’s a word for it or not.

The words might “just” be the labels, correct. As Alfred Korzybski (the founder of general semantics) famously popularized the idea that the map is not the territory, I’d argue that you still might get a lot out of this chronos-kairos distinction. And knowing the words, definitions and the what’s what is the first step.

In a way, these words are shortcuts to new mental models. Each mental model can be used like a lens to look at something differently. Sometimes this can lead to new insights, even different behaviors. All from selecting the right mental model for the task/problem at hand. Another helpful metaphor might be to view mental models as tools. And like in handiwork, it’s important to choose the right tool for the job at hand.

Definitions

So we have chronos for the linear aspect of time. Think of the word “chronometer”. Think of the measurable and quantifiable aspect of time. The dentist appointment is next Tuesday at 10:30. You practiced for two hours yesterday. Dinner tonight at 18:30? Four more weeks until event x.

Numbers, sequences, linearity. And like the Titan Cronus swallowing his children, linear time relentlessly continues marching on, devouring the present and future.

Kairos on the other hand is about the quality of time, the right time and about opportunities that might not come again. Being at the right place at the right time. Think serendipity, chance and flow state. However, it’s not just about huge opportunities that have the potential to radically change your life. No, it can be something simple like experiencing a beautiful sunset, spending a few minutes on a clear night watching the stars and reflecting on your place in this vast universe. If you are a parent, a smile from your child. A cup of high-quality tea. Feeling appreciation and gratitude for being alive. Those can be (beautiful) kairos moments as well – if you let them.

Clarifying that chronos-kairos difference lets you make a finer distinction between the various states of time you are in. In our hyper-productivity-obsessed world people have been conditioned to think mostly of the chronos aspect of time.

You Can’t Manage Time

• Time is the great equalizer.
• Everybody gets the same 24 hours a day.
• Don’t waste time.
• Time is money.

With proverbs like these, no wonder people get obsessed with time management and try to save time or squeeze the most out of it. The problem is, you can’t manage time. You can only manage yourself and the activities you do during the time that is available to you.

Saving time is also only possible in a rather indirect way. With e.g. money you can put money away and let it accumulate. That’s not possible with time. Time will be gone whether you use it for big or small stuff. So you can only save time by not wasting it on insignificant activities. Time is not money – time is more important: time is life.

So how do we get the most value out of our time?

Action Step: Questions to Ask Yourself

A helpful activity is to regularly ask yourself:

• Am I in chronos or kairos right now?
• Which kind of time-feel is more appropriate for the current task/activity?
• What can I do to facilitate the switch?

It’s important not to fall into the trap of thinking that chronos=bad and kairos=good. Chronos and kairos, like the two sides of the same coin, belong together. You actually need to master both. The better you can deal with chronos the more prepared you are for taking advantage of kairos.

Just becoming aware of the different qualities of time – and your own states of mind/energy – can already help you detect issues that you might want to change or at least give a second look. Then you can make the necessary adjustments to your schedule, to your planning, to your preparedness in order to capture any opportunities.

For instance, the corporate-style calendar management of scheduling meetings and thinking in one-hour time slots is not the best way to work for us musicians. At least not for the actual creative work. For creative pursuits we need to be able to immerse ourselves. To literally lose ourselves and let go of time.

Often we need a warming-up period for the creative juices to start flowing. If there’s an appointment/meeting scheduled for two hours from now, it’s difficult to even get going with our creative project. We know of that upcoming appointment. It’s occupying our mind and hanging over our head like the sword of Damocles. (Ha, another Greek anecdote ftw.)

Let’s say we still manage to get into that elusive flow state. Quicker than we want, time’s up and we have to go to our appointment. It’s frustrating because we interrupt the creative process. And if we let this happen a few times, we even might develop a kind of subconscious block where we won’t get creative ideas anymore in case we don’t have enough time available to us. Not helpful.

So what can you do to avoid this?

Create Space in Your Calendar

As much as possible, let go of meaningless activities and busywork. I realize that’s not easy and some busywork can’t be avoided, but maybe you can at least minimize the damage by rescheduling it, so it doesn’t get in the way of your important creative work. If possible, schedule similar activities together – like putting appointments/meetings back-to-back on the same day. Or schedule them for the late afternoon when creative energy is lower anyways. Keep longer periods of time free for creative projects. And obviously, make creative work a priority and actually schedule it in your calendar with enough time to immerse yourself.

Batch admin tasks like e-mail processing, paperwork, file organization etc. together. Personally, I have trained myself to classify projects/tasks in my task manager. I label things as either creative or admin/maintenance. This way I can then easily filter and batch-process similar activities at the appropriate time.

Action step: go over your calendar and reschedule activities by type. In essence, you create blocks of time that are dedicated to specific activities. Therefore, this technique is often called “time-blocking” in productivity circles. Time-blocking helps you avoid the switching cost when you constantly change the type of actions you do. And when you have large blocks of time available for creative projects, you then can get into the important flow state to make the most out of that time.

Use Your Circadian Rhythm to Your Advantage

Another area where huge gains are possible with comparatively little effort is to use your own circadian rhythm to your advantage. Over the course of the day, your energy level changes. Observing your energy states for a few days/weeks is a good investment of your attention. Once you’ve identified some patterns, try to match your activities to your energy levels. Don’t “waste” your highest energy hours on mundane, low-level admin type work. Save that stuff for times when your energy is naturally low(er). If you feel freshest in the morning, that’s where your highest priority work should go. Obvious, right?

This is where the concept is so helpful. Just by knowing that there is a right time, you have a mental model and know what to look for. Matching your activities to your energy level then lets you accomplish more with less effort.

Experiment with directly launching into writing/producing right after waking up. Maybe you are at the freshest without any outside input disturbing and influencing your innermost creative force. It’s also possible that you are a slow(er) starter and need to ramp up. That’s fine, too. In this case, create a morning routine that starts with a brief meditation, a slow breakfast, playing some Bach pieces, a short work out etc. Whatever works for you. Develop a routine that helps you center yourself and get ready for the day. Then launch into your creative work.

Most of my teaching takes place in the afternoon. Younger students happen to be at school during mornings. 😉 This lets me use the mornings for creative stuff when my creative energy is the highest. I do a ca. 40 minutes long morning routine (meditation, QiGong, light exercise, journaling, followed by a short music-fundamentals practice routine using the apps I featured in this article) for priming purposes before I launch into track production, writing or similar creative stuff. I don’t check e-mail until at least 11:30, so I don’t occupy mental RAM with other people’s agendas.

Exploit Motivational Bursts

Let’s say I scheduled a music production session for the time between 10:00 am and 1:00 pm. However, my mind is bubbling over with ideas for a new article to write because I started to read a book that provided valuable insights.

I definitely would change my plan and start to work on the article even though my pre-planned calendar entry says music production. Why? Because I want to capture that initial burst of inspiration, those fresh ideas. When inspired, things just flow and you get more done. In a flow state you can accomplish higher quality in higher quantity with less effort – so you need to seize the opportunity when it presents itself.

If the music track production had a set deadline in place and involved a client, things would look a bit differently. Of course I’d then need to focus on the client work to deliver what I promised on time in the best possible quality. In this scenario I most likely would start a voice recorder app on my phone and do a quick brain dump where I’d capture the main points of my inspiration so that would be saved and I would have my mind/attention free to focus on the work at hand.

Caveat: this does not mean you easily let yourself off the hook. Feeling “inspired” to binge-watch a Netflix show does not count. Only allow yourself to switch to similar scope projects. Writing an article or book chapter vs. painting vs. producing music etc. Similarly, I have no qualms switching between various admin tasks and/or chores. Cleaning out the garage vs. scanning in and processing paperwork – both are non-creative tasks that do need to happen at some time, but in general it doesn’t matter so much when exactly.

Optimize Your Environments

Another thing you can do during chronos time in order to prepare for kairos is to optimize the various environments you operate in. The less friction, the better you can focus and make the most out of your time.

• Is your work desk clutter-free?
• Do you have a pen and paper or a shortcut to your notes app ready?
• Do you have the right tools (software, sound libraries etc.) available for the job at hand?
• Is all your software updated and configured?

Get rid of any other distractions, put your phone away or on silent with all notifications turned off and get to work.

Connect Chronos Activities to Kairos Results/Outcomes

I’ve found it also helpful and motivating to connect and map somewhat tedious/boring/mundane activities that are more chronos-related to kairos outcomes.

Remind yourself occasionally of the purpose and the bigger picture. Why are you even doing this? Keep those kairos moments/outcomes in mind and let them alter the way you experience “the suck”. With enough practice you can train yourself to enjoy even the moments of struggle because you know that they’ll lead to a positive outcome in the future.

Mementos

Finally, it helps to have little mementos (photos, journal entries, music tracks that trigger emotions and memories) ready that remind you of those special moments, to get back into that special state of feeling and timelessness. Let the feeling rub off and influence your experience of time. The more you remind yourself of those special times, the more you connect with the feeling, the easier it becomes to recognize. In a way you are honing your senses to tune and calibrate themselves.

Again, chronos and kairos both have their place and it is on us to then make the most out of the time given to us. Thanks for your time reading. 🙂