The Tick-Tock Syndrome

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Time sickness, says Dossey, is nearing epidemic proportions today as people deploy state-of-the-art weaponry like fax machines, cellular phones, and power PCs in their efforts to beat the clock. Victims of time sickness, he adds, are obsessed with the notion "that time is getting away, that there isn't enough of it, and that you must pedal faster and faster to keep up.The trouble is, the body has limits that it imposes on us. And the body will not be fooled if we try to beat it into submission and ask more of it than it can deliver in a 24-hour day. It will let us know."

The typical signals the body sends are migraine headaches, irritable bowels, sleep disorders and low-grade depression. Of course, not everyone who suffers from these conditions has time sickness. What sets time-sick people apart, according to Dossey, is that when stressful conditions are removed, they continue to race the clock.They find it agonizing to wait, because waiting means that precious seconds are slipping away. Stuck in line or waiting for a bus, they can't stop glancing at their watches, exhaling loudly or drumming their fingers. When time sickness strikes Type A personalities, the combination is combustible: They not only chafe at having to stop at a red light, they also want to shoot out the light.

Dossey's method of treating time-sick people calls for changing their perception of time by getting them to slow down, through biofeedback or meditation or prayer, and to learn to actually step out of time with these same techniques. The benefits of a regular program of such "time exits" extend beyond improved health. "Therapy for time sickness is more than just solving high blood pressure or making headaches go away," he says. "It involves changes of behavior that lead to insight and wisdom."

Other physicians studying the medical problems suffered by time battlers agree with Dossey that daily programs of quiet reflection are essential to restoring health. Some of the most dramatic findings have been reported by Dr. Dean Ornish, president and director of the Preventive Medicine Research Institute in Sausalito, Calif., who found that cardiac patients experienced dramatic improvement when they took part in a comprehensive program of meditation and yoga. While Ornish's approach to treating time sickness is similar to Dossey's, he takes a somewhat different slant on the nature of the forces causing this disease. While Dossey points to technological gizmos as culprits in making people more susceptible to time sickness, Ornish argues that this view vests these machines with too much power.

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