If humans were to adopt octopus-inspired metaphors for time, our relationship to our personal past might become more meaningful. It would allow our past to be causally linked to the present. It might allow our attention to shift away from the culturally conditioned obsession with future-focused progress. It might allow historical ideas to be excavated and used as sources of innovation for everything from medicine to politics. And it might allow a more expansive conceptualisation of events that can be considered meaningful, all due to metaphors of time that are free from constraints.