For me, one of the most vital themes of John Robbins’ book Healthy at 100is the effects of stress on health and longevity. After finishing that book about six weeks ago, I began living without a watch.
Let me explain. For most of my teenage and all of my adult life, I have worn a wristwatch. Unless I was swimming, showering, or bathing the watch was my constant companion. I hate to be late – my personal motto is “Better early than on time” – and my watch helped me to always be the first to appear at any function. As a teacher, I needed a watch for recess and field trips.
God forbid I allow my kids to play a second longer than the fifteen minutes allotted during the school day, and if on field trip days we didn’t show up when the bus driver said he or she would be there, we would be stuck.
In my personal life, I’m always in the middle of five projects, and my watched helped me to keep a schedule so that I would finish every project as quickly and as efficiently as possible. And of course snacks and mealtimes must occur at precise hours of the day, and my watch helped to assure that I would be home at the exact time necessary to eat.
But some time in the last three and a half years I began to experience an internal struggle with time. Suddenly, I had this particular baby who wanted to be nursed at all hours of the day. His sleep schedule changed with every moon phase, new tooth and growth spurt.
My need (?) to live a scheduled life conflicted with Benjamin’s obvious more time-flexible personality, and this caused me much grief. Stress.
The effects of stress in the area of time-keeping were subtle. They no doubt contributed to my struggle with motherhood (although that was probably more nutrition-related) and occasionally suppressed immune function.
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The crazy thing is, once I became a stay-at-home mom, I no longer needed to live with a rigid schedule. Who cared if I showed up at Whole Foods at eleven instead of ten-thirty? Did it really matter if I was five minutes late to a playdate? And for crying out loud, it wouldn’t kill me to eat dinner thirty minutes later than usual!
Although I knew all this in the back of my head, knew that my acute awareness of time was probably causing me stress-related illness, it didn’t sink in until I read Robbins’ book.
So now, I no longer wear a watch. Sure, I look up at the clock on the microwave or the one in my car. But you will no longer catch me glancing at my wrist while running through Target. Or staring at it every minute during our last ten minutes at the park to make sure we leave “on time.”
Although I still make sure I am on time for any outside scheduled event, meal and snack times are now a lot more flexible. I get things done when I can get them done, and don’t worry about being “late.” And Benjamin has a somewhat mellower mommy.
I can feel the difference. I can tell that caring less about time is helping me to be happier and healthier. It is helping me to enjoy life more fully.
Living without a watch has been the best decision I’ve made in recent months.
Just please make sure, if I meet you for a playdate in the park one day, that you have your cell phone on hand. I might need to ask you what time it is, for old time’s sake. 
