What is time? Did you ever ask yourself, what is time? What does it mean time? And we hear stories of course from old people and from young people about what they did in the recent past. But what does time mean?
Is there a philosophical view of time or a psychological view of time or what is time? So with that in mind, I asked myself the other day, how do I catch the moment right now? How do I catch it? Well, I guess the only way I can catch it is to truly act in the moment. The other day, I was at a stoplight and it was quite a lengthy stoplight, 90 seconds, I think, or something.
And I turned the scooter off. And when I turned the scooter off, I heard the twittering of birds. It was just so bizarre. Like, where did these birds come from? I thought to myself.
But there they were. And I would never have heard them if I hadn’t diminished the roar that was coming from my scooter’s engine. So there’s a lesson here, isn’t there? Many years ago, I taught a dermatologist and he told me that if I was serious about the moment, I must learn to stop when I’m extremely busy. And I said, what do you mean doctor?
He said, well, when you’re really busy, that’s the time that you are the most open to understand something different. So he suggested that when you were really busy, perhaps you’re on that said scooter or in your car, but scooter is the best really because it’s fast. Right? There’s lots of noise around you. Pull to the side and stop.
Turn the scooter off. Take your helmet off and have a look around. So one day, I was coming down the freeway or something or other on my way to some class, and I was late, if I remember. And I had this momentary image in my head, and I did stop. And I heard, as I said earlier, the twitting of birds, but then it got larger.
I heard the sound of children laughing. There was a brook in the distance, and it was a very big world. It wasn’t just me isolated in my immediate plan to achieve something in a said period of time. I was part of something larger. It was tremendously comforting.
Tremendously. So I guess that’s time. Time is something that I ultimately control. Now doctor Csikszentmihalyi, he talks about the concept of flow. If I can get into my state of flow, I’m in a sense free.
It becomes magical. I lose my sense of time and in my state of flow, I am the most creative, the most productive. So you think to yourself, when you write perhaps an essay or you write a paper or you write a bit of music or you’re having some love affair and you’re looking at your loved one’s eyes or perhaps you’re walking with a child that you really enjoy, you know, perhaps your daughter or granddaughter, depending on your age. That’s all of those things are a state of flow. It’s a magical part of being alive and so maybe in a sense that’s also the relationship that one has with the supernatural, with God if you will.
That if you can be on a beach and at that magical magical moment, you’re in a special state. You’re 1, if you will, with the universe. And I’ve spoken to people. I’ve never had quite this experience. But I’ve spoken with people that have claimed to have had such an experience, and they’ve said it’s magical.
It removes them from the day to day frustrations of life and takes them to a special place. So then comes the question, how do I get there myself? Well, I think that you have to prime yourself and you do that with nature for sure. Because if you access nature in any way, in a park, in a forest, you get pulled away. Recently, when I was in Poland, I went for a long hike in the mountains and it seemed to somehow take me to a different place because the mountains were truly remarkable.
They were quiet and sensitive and there was a mist in the air and you could, of course, you heard the birds, but not a lot of birds. There was mostly just silence and time went on. But it was my time and a magical time as well. So I guess the lesson here is that if we really want to grasp time and get in our state of flow, we must be willing to spend some time with me, with the self. And whatever a busy activity I’m doing, I’ve got to remember that busyness is also created by the self, by me.
And I can step out of that time and be silent for a moment. So the next time you’re really busy, try it. Stop what you’re doing. Turn your gadget off, whatever that is, a scooter, a phone, whatever, and just be quiet for a time. And learn to listen to your inner voice and hear the sounds that are bigger than you, the sounds of the cosmos.
Because there are answers here, I am sure. And then, of course, write those thoughts down in your notebook. I’m big on the notebook as you know. And you know what they say. You know what they say.
Critical thinking is everything, especially if you’re going to catch your time, and critical thinking is great, truly great. You take care. God bless. Bye bye.