I have conceived of time in such a way that I defeat my aim. If I elect to reach past time to timelessness, I must change my perception of what time is for. ACIM-W-308:1:1-2
So , while still on the topic of suffering, and while I am thinking of an old Tina Turner tune where I slip 'time' in where 'love' should be,"What's time got to do with it?" ...I ask the question: What does time have to do in relation to our experience of suffering?
What is time?
In 1905 Einstein defined time as a reading on a perfectly synchronized clock located at the same position as the event,(http://www.fourmilab.ch/etexts/einstein/specrel/www/),
What is time besides the tick -tocking, hand sweeping momentum of an instrument created by the human race to measure some misunderstood phenomenon devised by the same race and labelled as time? Whew! That was a mouthful to read out loud. Probably should have used a different instrument too, for symbolic purposes. Some younger readers, if there are younger readers, may not even know what an analogue clock is lol.
What is time for?
I don't think we truly realize that time is just some theory we created to help us understand the process of Life. It is a mental construct, that's it, an idea, but it in itself is not real. Does this theory help us understand Life or does it take us further away from full understanding of it?
When we think of time we think of all the yesterdays of the past and all the tomorrows of the future, don't we? We rarely think of now. Past and future become our mental focus then ...and therefore it becomes our life. Time keeps us trapped in what happened before and what might happen in the future so that we don't experience the now. Technically, because of our reliance on time, we don't recognize, savour, experience the present moment where life really exists, where life only exists. We live in our tormented and delusional ego minds instead. And we suffer.
The Past
In this moment...instead of simply savouring life, we too often dig up and relive (in our minds only)past memories of all the wrongs that were done to us back then...all the mistakes, all the mistreatment, all our sins and the sins of others. Or we ruminate over the passage of this imaginary time and regret what we have lost, attempting to cling to all the sweet things of the world that came and went through those ticking hand motions of the clock. Sometimes we long to go back to a time we felt joy, safe or loved or use those memoriesas if they were precious stories we can distract from the now with. We do not connect to where we are right now, right here when we do that.
The past is not real. What ever went on back then is gone. Those moments cannot be physically relived. In this moment, the past is just thought. So when we are living in a memory be it one that brings joy or one that brings pain we are not truly embracing Life, are we? We are simply stuck in our minds.
The Future
We may also use time to escape the present moment and its reality that we just find too hard to accept for some reason. We may project notions about living into the future so life becomes an idea rather than a reality. We try to live in that future fantasy. We are even encouraged to do so with some of 'manifesting' instruction out there. We fantasize, imagine, hope, plan for, work for, strive for and anticipate a better life than this moment has to offer. "Things will be better when..." we tell ourselves. "When I get there, When I achieve that...When I find my true love...When he changes...When she changes...When Life becomes easier etc etc".... I will live then. So we hold our breath, close our eyes to the moment we are in and we wait to live.
Or we may dread the future. We may worry over, fret over, become sick over what may or may not happen in a time that isn't real. When tomorrow comes it will be today. When the next moment comes, it will be the moment. There is no future anywhere but in our minds. We spend our present moment in our heads suffering over something that isn't real. That's not living.
The Now
Is the only Life you have.
The instant is the only time there is. ACIM-W-308
Is Time responsible for Suffering
Yes! Ego loves our attachment to time. It needs us to stay in our minds, the only place it can exist. It wants us anywhere other than in the moment, here and now, because if we are present it can not survive. Ego is the antithesis of presence just as the now is the antithesis of past and future.
Most importantly fear is ego's fuel and fear depends on past and future to expand and grow. As long as we are hooked on time ego can be fueled by fear. It is fear that makes us retreat away from here and now, to hide, run, numb, distract and defend and attack. It is these things that cause our greatest suffering. In attempt to use these external things to escape suffering , we create even greater suffering for ourselves and the world.
Can we be saved from time and from suffering?
The only interval in which I can be saved from time is now. ACIM-W-308:1:4
The now will save us. The now equates to timelessness. It is in timelessness we will be free of fear
How?
We can come back to the here and now. We will never enter it if we are stuck in mind time.We can come down from our heads and into our bodies and our hearts. We can enter the present moment from there. We find the timelessness that will set us free.
What is the opposite of this fear that causes so much of our suffering? Love.
And love is ever-present, here and now. -ACIM-W-308:1:8
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