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Time Flies When You’re Stuck in Misery
Misery is a strange traveling companion. When life is rough, every day feels like it drags on forever. You count the hours, watch the clock, and swear that tomorrow will never come. And yet, when you glance back over your shoulder, whole months even years have slipped past like smoke between your fingers. That paradox is the cruel reality: time crawls while you’re suffering, but it also vanishes before you realize it.
The Slow Burn of Misery
When you’re stuck in hardship, whether it’s loneliness, financial strain, grief, or just the grinding weight of life, minutes stretch. The coffee cools before you’ve even taken a sip. Nights drag on in silence, where sleep won’t come, and mornings feel heavier than lead.
This is the part of misery where time becomes sticky. Every day feels repetitive, hollow. You don’t measure progress in achievements or milestones, you measure it in sheer survival. “I made it through another day” becomes your victory banner. And yet, even in that stretch, even when the weight feels unbearable, the calendar keeps flipping.
The Vanishing Trick
Here’s the kicker: ask someone who’s been in misery for a year how long it feels like they’ve been there, and you’ll hear two answers. On one hand, it feels like forever with endless nights, countless struggles, days that never seemed to move. On the other hand, they’ll also say: “I can’t believe it’s been a whole year already.”
That’s because suffering is a thief. It steals the richness of time. You’re present, yes, but not really living. You mark days without memories, weeks without joy, and months without milestones. When joy is absent, time stops being experienced it’s only endured. And when you only endure time, it disappears faster than you realize.
Why Misery Warps Time
Psychologists might tell you this is about attention and perception. When you’re happy, your brain is constantly stimulated noticing new things, building new experiences. Joy creates moments worth remembering. But when you’re miserable, every day looks the same. The brain has nothing to latch onto, no vibrant memories to store.
So here’s the paradox:
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In the moment, misery makes time crawl - because you’re hyper-aware of your suffering.
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In hindsight, misery makes time vanish - because you didn’t record enough meaningful moments to make the months feel “full.”
It’s like walking on a treadmill: you sweat, you struggle, you fight for every step… but when you look back, you’re still standing in the same place.
The Cost of Stagnation
This isn’t just poetic hand-wringing. Lost time has a cost. When misery traps you, opportunities slip by. Relationships weaken. Dreams gather dust. A decade can pass, and you realize you’re not much farther along than when you started except older, wearier, and angrier.
That realization is brutal. Nothing feels worse than looking back and asking, “What the hell happened to all those years?” The truth is, they happened. You were there. You just didn’t live them, misery did.
Breaking the Clock
So what’s the solution? Can you stop misery from robbing you blind? Not always. Pain comes for all of us. But here’s the key: misery doesn’t have to define your time.
Even in the hardest stretches, you can choose small acts that reclaim the clock:
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Create variety - shake up routines, even if it’s something small like walking a new street or trying a new meal. Your brain records novelty, which makes time feel fuller.
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Mark victories - journal, track habits, or simply write down one thing you endured or accomplished each day. These tiny markers add weight to passing days.
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Seek connection - a single conversation, laugh, or hug can anchor a day into memory, keeping it from being swallowed by the void.
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Move with purpose - misery thrives on stagnation. Any step forward, no matter how small, disrupts its hold.
These don’t erase suffering, but they stop it from erasing you.
The Hope Inside the Hurt
The phrase “time flies when you’re stuck in misery” isn’t entirely negative. There’s a hidden hope buried in it: even when life is awful, time still moves forward.
That means nothing lasts forever. Your current misery however crushing it feels is temporary. It will pass, because everything does. The same clock that drags also carries you forward, day by day, toward a different season. You may not feel it now, but change is inevitable.
And when you’re finally free from that season of suffering, you’ll realize something else: you survived it. Time didn’t stop. You didn’t stop. You made it through.
Reclaiming Time
The challenge then becomes this: once you’ve crawled out of misery, don’t let the rest of your life get stolen by the same trick. Fill your days with things that make them memorable: laughter, risk, creativity, even failure. Anything but stagnation.
Because the opposite of misery isn’t just happiness it’s living fully. It’s packing your time so tightly with moments that, when you look back, you don’t say “Where did the time go?” Instead, you say “Damn, look what I did with it.”