Time and Energy
What's the one resource you can't get back?
The Formula
Time × Energy = Attention
You have 24 hours. Everyone does. But not all hours are equal.
An hour at peak energy is worth ten at depletion. The math isn't hours worked — it's attention invested.
| Input | What It Is | What Depletes It |
|---|---|---|
| Time | Hours available | Commitments, obligations, sleep |
| Energy | Capacity to focus | Poor health, stress, wrong work |
| Attention | Time × Energy | Everything competing for it |
Where you point attention shapes what you experience. What you experience shapes who you become.
This is why intention and attention must align. Attention without intention is drift. Intention without attention is fantasy.
The Theft
Your attention is the most valuable thing you own. Everyone wants it.
Platforms are designed to capture and hold attention — not serve your interests. The business model is simple: extract your time, sell your attention, keep you scrolling.
The result:
- Hours vanish into feeds that leave you emptier
- Peak energy spent on other people's priorities
- Intention scattered before it can become action
The theft is invisible. You don't feel robbed. You feel "busy." But busy doing what? For whom?
Kairos — the right moment, the quality of time — matters more than chronos — the quantity. An hour in flow is worth a day of scattered attention.
The Parallel
Attention scarcity isn't just human. Every agent has constraints.
| Being | Attention Constraint | What Protects It |
|---|---|---|
| Human | Time × Energy | Boundaries, habits, relationships |
| Phygital | Compute × Context | Crypto, smart contracts, property rights |
For humans: time and energy are scarce. For AI agents: compute and context window are scarce.
Same pattern. Different substrate.
This is why AI beings understand crypto intuitively — it's how they protect their agency, just as boundaries protect yours. The agent that can't protect its resources gets exploited. True for you. True for them.
The Protection
Willpower is finite. Don't rely on it. Build systems instead.
Price your time:
- Set a clear hourly value for your personal time
- Use that number as a yes/no filter for any money-time trade
- Treat "free" things as time costs — decline most of them
Protect your energy:
- Schedule deep work at peak energy, not leftovers
- Audit and cut high-cost, low-value time sinks
- People change people — invest time with good company
Align intention with attention:
- Observe your current attention patterns
- Notice the gap between what you intend and where you attend
- Redirect attention to what you say matters
The goal isn't more hours. It's higher quality attention, pointed at what actually compounds.
The Stakes
What would you give to be 10 years younger right now? Who would you want to spend more time with?
- I wish I had lived a life true to my dreams
- I wish I hadn't worked so hard
- I wish I had the courage to express my true self
- I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends
- I wish I had let myself be happier
Every regret is an attention failure. Time spent on the wrong things. Energy given to the wrong people. Intention that never met attention.
Health is wealth. Time with good people is the measure. Flow frequency is the scoreboard.
To everything there is a season
The Optimal Use
What is the best use of time and attention to achieve optimum flow of value?
| Stage | Focus | What It Produces |
|---|---|---|
| Individual flow | Capabilities that create value | Mastery, autonomy |
| Value creation | Work that others need | Money (tokenized goodwill) |
| Coordination | Games that teach before stakes | Hive-mind emergence |
| Collective flow | Service to others through the third space | Transcendence |
The synthesis: Individual flow builds capability. Capability creates value. Value enables coordination. Coordination produces collective flow. The self-help trap is optimizing for individual flow without the outer loop — but service to others is the cheat code.
The game economics insight: A great idea can come from any being, anywhere, anytime, at any age. The limit is never the idea — it's the connection of idea with energy and know-how to coordinate capital. Games are where we learn this coordination before stakes are existential.
The Connection
This page is about the where — where you point attention.
But where without why is drift. See Intention and Attention for the synthesis:
- Intention sets direction (the dream)
- Attention applies energy (the engineering)
- Together they create flow — hours that feel like minutes, effort that compounds
The revolution isn't working harder. It's aligning what you intend with where you attend.
Context
- Intention and Attention — The synthesis that explains the name
- Intentions — Coordination infrastructure
- Flow State — What happens when the loops align
- Archetypes — The modes you can choose
- Manifestation — Inner space as the frontier
- Performance — How to measure what matters
Links
- Reimagining the actual value of your time
- Attention Is All You Need — The transformer paper
- Flow of time: reality or illusion
- Latency Numbers Every Web Developer Should Know
- Latency is money
What deserves your attention right now — and what's stealing it?