Sanatorium for temporal confusion

As a sanatorium, we do our utmost to keep external influences out of our building. That is a serious challenge because we live in a mediatized society. This has led to a severe disorder: the 'social organization of attention' towards the short-term.

Mass media, such as tv, always tended to focus their reporting on scandals about shocks instead of on longer-term trends and patterns. This is only exacerbated by online media, whose connection to the public is not dependent on a fixed broadcasting time but on the clicks of audiences wanting to learn about the latest event. No wonder in such a system, the public starts to think the world is actually made up of disconnected events (contrast this, for instance, with the Buddhist notion of 'dependent arising'). We are shocked when floodings occur but fail to accept that we've been tinkering with the biophysical system and that particular river for decades. As a largely failed politician succinctly captured the essence of this disorder: 'Events, dear boy, events'. 

We are happy to receive many people that have the drive to change the world for the better. With our treatment, we definitely do not want to 'cure' patients from altruism. However, we see that altruism is often accompanied by a problematic sense of emergency – the idea that we are confronted with an urgent and enormous crisis that must be solved immediately, whatever the costs.

A case in point is the idea of a 'climate emergency'. While even we psychiatrists see that the world is heating up quickly and rapid action is needed, we deem the notion of emergency utterly problematic. When your house is on fire, there is an emergency, and the fire brigade should respond a.s.a.p., whatever the consequences. For the planet, the case is different. Do we want to give up democracy to 'fight' climate change? And shouldn't we realize that there is also life after the emergency, that even in a 4-degree world, people will still live, however difficult? Although admittedly, they will have different things to worry about than temporal disorders. 

In our sanatorium, several patients suffer from a deep frustration. In a way, they are more temporally sane than most because they realize that we should represent future generations and non-humans in our decision-making processes. They find inspiration in animist cultures, which see it as ridiculous that humans ought to own land and for whom thinking seven generations ahead is a commonsensical practice.

For these people, the confusion lies in the confrontation of this healthy temporal perspective with the world as they find it. A world we call 'democratic', but which is actually about four-year election cycles. A world in which short-term financial profits still trump many other ends. A world in which we don't care about future generations. The feeling of people suffering from this disorder can be captured in a single phrase of a brave Swedish woman: 'How dare you.'.  
 

Along with the industrial revolution, a temporal revolution took place. We started to have 'work days' and later 'weekends'. The clock became the central instrument for organizing time. It became possible to be 'early' or 'late'. The promise was that we would become masters of our time.

The economist Keynes proposes that we should only have two working days' for human flourishing. That failed. We now work five days a week or even more. Companies needed to restrict access to e-mail during the evening or at the weekends because the work day seemed to be an exponential force. Hobbies disappeared.

At the same time, we start to reappreciate the rhythm of nature. The flow of the seasons, the limitations of daylight, and the energy the sun and wind provide are not infinite. Such restrictions give rhythm to life. However, this natural rhythm conflicts with the clock time rhythm and many patients feel they are in limbo. They want to move to a more natural temporal state of mind but are held back by the status quo. Our therapists are working ferociously to develop treatments for this cure.