Stepping out of Time

"Time is but a stream I go a -fishing in," wrote Henry David Thoreau. Time is like an ever flowing river, just don't get caught up believing it's real.  In other words, don't take it so seriously. Have fun and enjoy life.  I hope the discussion below will help you step out of the constraints of time and into a more life of freedom.

Time can be used as a noun or a verb.  For example, you might say, "Your time was slow" - noun. Or, you can say, "I am going to time how fast you can run" - verb. Time is most often used as a noun, and because time is a concept it is often thought of as a fact.  You will hear people say, "I'm running out of time," "There never is enough time," "Time is money," "What time is it?" or "Time is short."  When the word time is used in this context it is as if time is a stationary event - a hard, cold fact. Because time is often viewed as a fact it is a limiting factor in our lives. The concept of time gets stuck in our heads and limits our ability to go beyond it and enjoy what is right in front of us.  We get stuck in the time factor and don't stop to smell the roses. 

It's time to eat.  It's time to go to sleep.  It's time to get up.  It's time to go to work.  How can you step out of the constraints of time and live a freer life?  It's not as difficult as you might think.  In fact, thinking is the problem, not the solution.  You can step out of the time factor by observing it rather than being caught up in it.  Look at yourself in the mirror and you will see a person who has aged over the years but yet the feeling you have of who you are has not changed. By being the observer and not using your memory, you will experience yourself as unchanging.  You are not affected by time because you are outside the context of time. 

If you look at yourself in a mirror you might remember a younger you while the present you is being reflected in the mirror.  By using a little imagination you can visualize what you will look like in the future - say ten or twenty years down the road.  If you can view yourself in the past, present, and future at the same time, you are experiencing a time continuum from the outside.  You have loosened the concept of time as a static limitation because you are on the outside looking in.

Being the observer of time (past, present, and future) puts you outside of time.  You are no longer caught up in its constraints.  You can do this exercise anytime and any where you choose.  Watch a thought as it passes through your mind.  Notice how and where the thought begins.  Notice its present situation and continue to watch it as it passes away.  By doing this you are no longer affected by the thought because you are outside of it. You are no longer locked in the experience and no longer the thought.  You have stepped outside of time as the observer.  If you are having a bout of anxiety, depression or some troubling thought you can always reflect on when it started, where it presently resides, and watch it come to an end.  Do this and you will become a freer person - free from time.

In the next blog I will discuss how you can go even further in your freedom.

The Illusion of Time

Most people see time as a way to measure the duration of some activity divided into past, present, and future. This is an illusion which traps one in a linear and limited web of existence.  Many great minds in physics have contemplated, studied and measured the various aspects of time. David Bohm, one of the greatest theoretical physicists of the 20th Century, considers everything in the universe as existing simultaneously - no past, present, or future - only NOW.  "The inseparable quantum interconnectedness of the whole universe is a fundamental reality." The only reason humans think there is time is because of the thinking mind. As long as there are thoughts, there is time.

Karl Pribram, a noted neurophysiologist at Stanford University, did extensive work on human thought and came to the conclusion that, "Free will of thought is based on constraints.  The more constraints the fewer degrees of freedom we have in our thinking."  In other words, the human mind is limited in its understanding of time and space and doesn't have the capacity to understand the concept of no time.
Time only exists subjectively, as long as you are there to be aware of it.  In order for there to be time there has to be the illusion of a you separate from everything else.  As long as you are dividing everything up into the concept of past, present, and future; there will be time.  In order to get out of the constraint of the time concept you must free yourself of thoughts. 

Gestalt Psychology research has demonstrated time and time again that human thinking organizes things in a linear way. This linear way of thinking presents the appearance of time as if there were a past, present, and a future.  There is no way we can get out of it unless we can free ourselves of thoughts. Psychiatrist Milton H. Erickson did extensive research on the human mind and ultimately came to the conclusion that the mind is composed of linear thoughts.  He acknowledged the fact that the past as well as the future are taking place right now in the moment.  To go beyond linear thinking is to see there is no time involved when it comes to the reality of the universe.

If we are going to every go further in our understanding of the universe we must realize that the universe does not obey human reasoning.  As long as we try to explain things explicately through logic and thinking we will never be able to experience the implicate.  The classic model of the universe is composed of separate and independent parts which is a mechanistic view that we will have to overcome if we are to ever understand the totality of reality. Everything living and non-living are bound together as an unbroken whole - intertwined together not as separate entities but as a colloidal mixture.

In the next post I will discuss how you can step out of time and experience no time.

Is it possible to have no houghts?

A student asked me the other day after yoga class if it was possible to have no thoughts.  He said that it seemed to him that his mind was always thinking no matter what he was doing.  "I can be doing just about anything, even deep meditation, and the subtlest thoughts will be there," he said.  I asked him if he had thoughts when he was sleeping without dreaming.  "Well," he said, "I don't think so."  I then asked him if time seems to go by fast when he is in non-dreaming sleep, and he said it did.  I said, "The same is true when a person is under anesthesia.  You can be put out and wake up hours later and it seems like no time has passed at all."  He nodded and said, "Yes, I see what you mean."
There is no time when there are no thoughts.  Time and thoughts are inherently linked like birds and feathers.  Once a person is born, time begins because thoughts begin. Thoughts are a product of the mechanical mind and with maturation of the brain thoughts become more and more pervasive.  Thinking is an inheritant characteristic of the mind.  The way to stop time is to stop thinking. This doesn't mean that the process of aging, decomposition or the expansion of the universe will stop. The processes of aging and movement will continue, but without time.  This is so, because time, whether it is clock time or psychological time, is only a concept of the thinking mind. 

If you are truly in deep meditation, with no thoughts, there is no time; there can't be.  But, if you are meditating on thoughts or the breath or something having to do with the process of thinking, time is relevant and will appear to be present.  For example, if you start your meditation at 9:00 AM and focus on breathing for an hour, it will seem like an hour has gone by because it has - in both psychological and clock time.  It will be l0:00 AM.  But, if you focus on nothing in particular and go into a very deep meditation, one hour will go by very quickly, as though time has stood still. That's because during the deep meditation there is no time.  Yet, when you look at the clock, one hour has passed. The clock's hands continue to move even when there is no time.

Consciousness and Objects

When you look at another person, a rock, or even yourself in a mirror there is a feeling that all of those objects are separate and definitely distinct from who you truly are.  You can't really put your finger on it but  it seems like you are consciousness and the world is nothing but objects and space. What is this impression of me and them - consciousness and the objective world?

As you ascend into a higher level of consciousness it becomes clear that consciousness and the objective world are one and the same. However, the mind prevents us from seeing the two as one. It prevents us from seeing exactly what is. The mind and the ego are undeniably linked like fleas on a dog. It is possible to rid the dog of fleas and it is possible to rid the mind of ego.

Once the mind is freed from ego everything becomes crystal clear.  We are a perfect blend of consciousness and objects. Once we know our essential nature, self-realization emerges, not as knowledge but as experience of awakening to what is inherent in all of us - Oneness.  Consciousness, body, mind, senses, sound, light, objects and space are all the same - there truly is no difference. Everything we see and do not see, know and do not know, exist and are indelibly the same.  When this inherent experience is allowed to blossom, anything imaginable becomes possible.

The Ego

Here is an article I wrote some time ago about the ego. I think it is worth revisiting.

           http://ezinearticles.com/?You-Can-Transcend-the-Ego&id=2319360

The Power of Pure Awareness

The ability to stay in the moment with complete awareness to what is happening outside and inside of you while at the same time being connected to all of the energy in the universe is pure awareness.  When you are in this state of oneness there is no despair of what happened and no fear of what may happen.  And whatever is happening right now, in this very moment, is okay. 

For the most part, most people are focused on themselves - their problems, beliefs, desires, aches and pains and their memories. The other day a person said to me, "I wake up each morning feeling imprisoned in a system stacked against me." Too many people are burdened by the past and the future. They are hoping that things are going to be better in the future; that things are not okay now so things must get better tomorrow or the next day or maybe next year. With this kind of thinking, it is impossible for things to get better.  Many religions and karmic beliefs have hope for a better future, a better afterlife or something that will bring salvation to them later if they do something different and "better" in this life.

This very moment is all there is, and to live in this present moment with total awareness is like waking up from a nightmare and discovering you were having a bad dream. Life without momentious living is a nightmare. Everything seems chaotic with turmoil everywhere. All that can be seen is suffering, disagreements, anger, disease, injustice and on and on. It is no wonder people want to escape to another life - die and go to heaven - be reincarnated as someone or something else. For someone who is living out of the present moment and out of pure awareness there seems to be nothing to live for.

Pure awareness is living without judgment. Everything is going on but there is no reaction to the situation. There are no worries about the past or the future. There is no jumping up and down, yelling and screaming. You simply observe and take action without reacting. Thinking and sensing become very keen and decisions made are with calmness and repose. Decisions are made, not with judging good or bad, but with understanding. The ability to see clearly and act with compassion, sympathy, and empathy is powerful but it is not the most powerful thing that pure awareness provides.

What is most powerful about pure awareness is its infectiousness which can spread to everyone connected with any situation that happens to present itself in the moment. Calmness and understanding become increasingly prevalent and situations that seemed dire and unsolvable become unraveled and mastered.  This is the power of pure awareness. The power is not retained or maintained by any one person but grows and becomes shared by all who are concerned with the experience of the moment.

I have been gone from this site for a week to visit a cousin who has cancer. There were no computers where I was and since I don't have a laptop I didn't have an opportunity to post on the blog.  My cousin lives 1,500 away so I had time to prepare myself at home and on the plane.The visit was an event that I knew could be unpleasant if I wasn't in pure awareness, so I prepared by meditating everyday to keep in touch with the Divine. My cousin lives with his mother (my aunt) who has Alzheimer's and neither one can care for the other. 

When I arrived at their house my cousin was in bed and couldn't get up. His bed was wet with urine and he couldn't walk to the bathroom. My aunt didn't know what was wrong with him and had no idea what to do.  She did know, however, that he was sick. She continually asked me who I was and where I lived. I cared for the two of them the best I knew how. 

By the time I left my cousin was back on his feet, feeding himself, walking around and he drove himself to the grocery store.  The two of them were sitting on the couch drinking coffee and talking about old times when I walked out the door to come home.  Miraculous things can happen in pure awareaness.

I would like to discuss the power of pure awareness on my next post.