Chronos and Kairos

Before Darden, I had made up my mind to to take things easy, to not be caught up in little things. I had in mind sipping a cool iced tea while floating down a gentle stream. Since my arrival, I have found (as I suspect many of my peers have) that it's very difficult to avoid being swept up by the strong currents of the myriad of academic and career challenges at Darden. I also found myself working hard to not measure myself against others, against their accomplishments. This generally reminded me to think about what my time means here, and how I needed to think bigger picture. Some time ago, I that the ancient Greeks had two words for time: chronos and kairos. Whereas we are all familiar with the progression of temporal time (chronos), kairos refers to a different perspective on time. Kairos means the right time, or due season, and cannot be measured unlike the time we generally think of. In religious setting, it can mean an appointed time. What I remembered was that I ought not to think about the weight of each passing hour of case load and career briefings, but to think about what my time at Darden means and how that fits into the bigger picture of what I want to do with my life and career.