Word of the Month: Time
Have you ever experienced time distortion? Time flies when you’re having fun. Time crawls when you’re bored. Time stops when you’re in love. Time is running out. Time marches on relentlessly. Time is a valuable commodity. I will love you til the end of time.
The end of time? Does time have an end?
We count time in seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years, decades, centuries, millennium, etc., yet how can something we measure using such precise mathematical increments have such diverse qualities? Is time purely subjective — a figment of our own perception?
Time Distortion
In hypnosis, time and space often feel distorted. Like a dream, you can travel to a Caribbean blue sea, push on a trick bookcase that opens up to a city far away, fly through golden fields in slow motion, or sink into a deep dark space of silence.
Sometimes you remember nothing but come out of trance feeling refreshed— as if you’ve had a full night’s sleep. You’ve slowed down to the appropriate tempo for enjoying life. Time is on your side.
An hour of hypnosis can feel like a few minutes and 15 minutes can feel like a week. Time slows down and expands like the open arms of a welcoming friend. Experiencing time as a friend persists for a while. Living in the vast space of time at a manageable pace feels like a dream come true. How can we maintain that feeling when we go back to our busy lives?
We normally think of time as linear. We wake up at 5 or 6AM. The previous day has passed and cannot be retrieved. The future is yet to come. We have our to-do list and march through the day getting things done, checking off each item, feeling satisfied with having used our time well.
Is Time Really Linear?
Is time linear or does it only feel that way in certain states of mind? Which experience of time (distortion) is true?
When I traveled out-of-body at the time of my bike accident, past, present, and future felt compressed into all-at-once. I perceived the random puzzle pieces of my life as a perfect whole. It felt as if everything had been completed. I knew that everything in the future had already happened. I was just a witness to its unfolding. There was nothing to do but be at peace in the completion.
The Cult of Busyness
It’s easy, in modern society, to buy into the cult of busyness, which feeds off the notion of linear time. OMG. I have SO MUCH TO DO. I better hurry up and get all this done. OMG what if I don’t have enough TIME to GET IT ALL DONE! All this adds up to stress. Time is running out. Time is scarce. Time becomes the enemy.
I came back into my body and had LOTS of things to do, but I was incapable of physically engaging in the cult of busyness. I had to slow down due to my injuries and long-term healing process.
My experience of time on the other side showed me a different perception of time. So I practiced that feeling of wholeness and completion while I lay there watching everything pile up. I surrendered to being incapable of doing it all. That’s when time opened up for me in a whole new way.
Make Time Your Friend Using Time Distortion
What if you had PLENTY of TIME to get things done? Play a game with me for a few minutes and I’ll show you how.
Imagine for a moment that what you have to do is already done. Imagine your project, activity, or goal as if it were complete —a fait accompli. Close your eyes and imagine the scene in great detail. Then move into the feeling. What does it feel like to be finished? Can you experience the peace in that successful moment?
I’m not saying you should just pretend everything is finished and not do anything. No, no, no. But when you do this exercise, and hold the feeling of completion within yourself, everything that needs to get done becomes evident, your intuition kicks in, and you’re on your way to completing your to-do list with confidence.
But the other thing that happens, an even greater gift, is that you can feel if you’re taking on projects, activities, or favors for others that are not well-suited to you, your health, or your well-being. The vibes become obvious when you put yourself in the frame of mind as if something is already completed. When you “try on” the situation, it either feels right or wrong. It’s like trying on a piece of clothing or a pair of shoes and walking around to see if they fit right.
So the question is this: how does it feel to take on something that will take up your valuable time? Time IS a valuable commodity. And though time never runs out, when we’re in a physical body, this physical life DOES end. How would you like to spend it?
How do you use your time? Is your time filled with endless rushing around to get things done or do you relax into the flow of what you choose to do with your valuable time? Have you sorted through your opportunities and commitments, tried them on, chosen the ones that fit like a glove, and put the others back on the rack? Have you taken on ill-fitting commitments?
Take a breath and let yourself float back to a time in your life when you felt in your skin and friends with time. This happens for me when I walk in nature and hear the sound of water flowing in the creek, listen to the gentle breeze blowing through the leaves, and take the time to look around at the natural beauty of trees and wildlife. I feel friends with time when I float back to pleasant memories, especially from childhood —when I flew a kite, rode my bike, jumped on a trampoline, swam, played with my cat, or absorbed myself in a creative project.
“Time you enjoy wasting, was not wasted,” John Lennon
If you think that daydreaming about pleasant memories is child’s play that busy adults have no business thinking about, think again. Does growing up mean letting go of the joy of living in order to chase after endless obligations? If you’ve lost that feeling, daydreaming about pleasant memories will reawaken it for you. As John Lennon said, “Time you enjoy wasting, was not wasted.”
What makes time stand still for you? Float back to that moment in time and breathe that feeling of completeness into your body. Compare that feeling to the one you get when you try on a possible commitment to see if it feels right. Be aware of how you feel and let that guide your decision-making.
There’s no time like the present to sort through your priorities and cut back on activities that bite into your valuable time. For time waits for no man.
Time
/tīm/
Continued existence and events in the past, present, and future
A portion allotted; a moment
An occasion
A schedule
