Right now, I am looking out my window at the river. It’s winter, and the water is a deep, metallic grey, moving with a heavy, quiet grace. If I let my mind wander, I can almost feel the "future" version of this view—the way the sun will eventually bake those rocks, the way the waves will turn a bright, translucent blue and ripple warmly over the stones. I can practically smell the summer silt. But as soon as I go there, I’ve left the room.  We spend our lives checking our watches, yet we’ve never actually lived in a minute that wasn't "now." We treat time like a long hallway we’re walking down, with a door at the end labeled The Future and a trail of dust behind us called The Past . But if you stop and look around, the hallway is an illusion. There is only the room you are standing in. Memory vs. Anticipation Think about it: The Past is just a collection of neural firings—a memory occurring now . The Future is just a mental simulation—an anticipation occurrin...