Neil McNicholas: Seize each day at a time and enjoy the lovely ride of life

The shops have had their Christmas stock on display since late-summer and many of our town councils installed their Christmas lights back in October ready to illuminate, at the earliest possible opportunity, the high street's lemming-like charge to Christmas.

They say that time seems to pass more quickly the older you get, but I'm not entirely convinced – and not just because I'm getting older myself!

It seems to me that as you head into your "senior years" – and particularly if you were trying to pretend otherwise – you would try even harder to savour the days as they come along. Perhaps it's making the best use of our time, and keeping ourselves busy, that makes us lose track of time.

If we were bored or inactive the days would surely seem to pass more slowly – like when you go on a trip and the anticipation of getting there always seems to make the journey longer than when you're taking less notice on the way home.

The more likely reason why time passes so quickly for all of us, young and not-so-young alike, is the fact that we are typically busy people – or, at least, we make ourselves busy. There can be so many legitimate demands on our time, both within our homes and families and outside of them, that we often find there just aren't enough hours in the day.

We also take on all sorts of additional commitments and we love it; we love the buzz; we love the fact that our busy-ness keeps us on the edge, keeps us just out-of-reach. And isn't texting a symptom of the disease: I can't actually talk to you now because I'm far too busy and I'm on the move.

And this is where all our forward planning comes from: we can't settle in the present, we're already onto the next item on our agenda, like a jockey or a Formula One driver always two jumps ahead, two bends in the track. In so many areas of our life, we are constantly planning for the future. We move from one event to another, one activity to the next, diaries (or their electronic equivalent) necessarily to-hand or, even better, actually in-hand.

From my own point of view as a priest, I often feel that always having to anticipate and plan for the next church season on the calendar doesn't help the experience that time is flying by, but the danger for me and for all of us in planning constantly for the future is that we can begin to miss out on the present.

Today is the tomorrow we planned for yesterday but we never really appreciate it when it arrives because we've already moved on to tomorrow!

Life can start to feel like we're hanging on to the reins of a runaway horse. The question is: how can we regain control? In his song, Secret o' Life, James Taylor says, "The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time" – not, of course, enjoying its passage as such, but enjoying life as it passes. In other words life isn't just a journey from birth to death, it's about how we spend the time along the way.

In her book Death: The Final Stage of Growth, Elisabeth Kbler-Ross writes: "If you live as if you'll live for ever, it becomes too easy to postpone the things you know you must do. You live your life in preparation for tomorrow or in remembrance of yesterday, and meanwhile each today is lost."

It's the old adage about taking life one day at a time. Carpe diem –"seize the day". The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time, making the most of the here and now. So how can we slow down the horses? Jayne Dowle's questions again: "What happened to having to wait for something really worthwhile? What happened to enjoying the delicious sense of anticipation which we used to have, as the year gradually unfolded?" James Taylor (same song): "Isn't it a lovely ride, sliding down, gliding down? Try not to try too hard. It's just a lovely ride."

Father Neil McNicholas is a priest at St Hilda's Parish, Whitby.