4 ideas
A grey man visits the barber Fusi and calculates his whole life in seconds. He shows Fusi that the hours spent chatting with customers, caring for his mother, keeping a budgerigar and visiting Miss Daria are 'wasted', and persuades him to deposit that time in the Timesavings Bank. Fusi cuts every haircut short and drops his attachments, but he never gets any time back and becomes hurried, irritable and joyless.
Time is life itself, and it exists only as it is lived and felt in the heart. It is harvested by the grey men, who smoke it as cigars to stay alive. The more people optimize their hours, the faster their days feel and the less life they actually have.
Momo's only gift is that she listens with complete, unhurried attention and offers no advice. Because of this, people discover what they already think. Quarrelling neighbours reconcile, the unsure find their resolve, and the lonely feel they matter. Her power works through sustained presence rather than intervention, which is exactly what a time-scarce society stops being able to afford.
Beppo the road sweeper explains that if you look at the whole long street, you hurry, grow breathless and fall behind. His method is to think only of the next step, the next breath and the next stroke of the broom. That way the work becomes enjoyable and gets done without you noticing. Narrowing attention to the present unit of work replaces anxiety about the total task.