After years of listening to yammering politicians say the same things over and over, I heard something new recently.

I first took note of it last month when Democratic gubernatorial hopeful Troy Jackson, standing beside the Kennebec River, began talking about the joy he felt as a youngster exploring the isolated bends of the Saint John River with his father.

Then the former state Senate president noted most families today don’t have the same opportunity.

“Time is slipping away from them,” Jackson said, as long hours at work make it difficult for them to enjoy Maine’s woods and waters. He said we need to find ways to give ourselves the time to nourish our souls in “our glorious surroundings.”

Then I heard Graham Platner, who is almost certain to be the Democratic candidate in this year’s U.S. Senate race, address the same issue.

“We need to have a new definition of freedom,” he told a small crowd last week in Lewiston. “Not merely a romantic definition that encompasses individual rights, but a freedom that is real.”

Then Platner hit the sweet spot: “The freedom to have time, to have energy. The freedom to not be defined by anxiety and fear.The freedom to take risks, to be able to start a business or make art or make music or write a book. The freedom to fall in love, to raise a family, the freedom to own a home to raise that family in, the freedom to live lives defined not by struggling and scraping by, but by dignity and fulfillment.”

Jackson returned to the issue on Saturday when he told the delegates at the Maine Democratic Convention in Portland that powerful people have committed their “greatest robbery” by snatching away our time.

“We are so finite,” Jackson said. “We have lived such short lives with only one chance to do it.”

He urged supporters to reclaim “these fleeting days that we have with our parents, with our children, with our loved ones, these fleeting days that we have to fulfill our dreams” and “enact the changes that we are passionate about.”

That notion that people — all of us — ought to have the time and opportunity to do what we love with those we care about isn’t something new in the world. It just hasn’t been an issue in politics. Until now.

I don’t know how the government can give us more time, but I am sure doing so has the potential to transform our lives.

That highway sign declaring Maine offers “the way life should be” always makes me think of our rocky coasts, lovely lakes and a myriad of recreational opportunities.

It also makes me a bit sad. So much of what attracts tourists here is out of reach for most Mainers, including me. We’re too busy scrambling to pay our bills and buried under a seemingly endless to-do list to enjoy the outdoors much.

The idea of a new freedom that offers the time to pursue happiness is hugely attractive, utterly nonpartisan and potentially revolutionary. I hope it catches on.

As I said last week, Gov. Janet Mills, fresh off from suspending her U.S. Senate campaign, can now get out and enjoy everything Maine offers. She shouldn’t be the only one.