On doing things for the first time

How to overcome fear and invite new experiences into your life

1.

Opportunities to do something for the first time tend to diminish as the years pass. As we settle into careers, relationships, and routines, we can overlook or even avoid trying new things.

Yet such experiences can bring aliveness. The theory behind why time seems to pass quicker as we get older is that we tend to have fewer novel experiences. When we look back on our days, they appear to have flown by because we can’t distinguish them as easily. As neuroscientist David Eagleman explains, we can slow down time by seeking novelty to imprint new memories: “The reason this works is because new experiences cause the brain to write down more memory, and then when you read that back out retrospectively, the event seems to have lasted longer.”

We need to actively seek out new experiences, new firsts. Not only because such things refresh our days, but they can reveal something new about ourselves, too. As Pierre-Auguste Renoir said, “One must from time to time attempt things that are beyond one's capacity.”