My journal of small revelations

[Guest guest]

15 Jan 08

Time is a human concept. A completely made up invention, concocted by humans for convenience. Animals don’t have any inkling of what time is, nor do plants. They go along with nature’s cycles, but they have no clue what yesterday or January means. They don’t have the Monday morning blues, or the TGIF sighs. Man, out of his logical, thinking, rational brain, came up with dividing each day into hours, minutes, and seconds, and as if that’s not enough, microseconds, miniseconds, and nanoseconds, all in the name of efficiency and convenience. He came up with names for each day of the week, each day of the month, and even names for each year. And the same man who invented this concept is now a slave to time, utterly and completely. It’s like something out of a horrific science fiction movie, where the robot that man made

comes back to haunt and kill him. Except that this is today’s reality.

 

Imagine then, how merciful is our Lord, who came down to this earth, to walk among people, to show us the way, had to limit himself to human time. Him, the Kalatheethaaya, the one who transcends time, the one who is omnipresent, for whom the past and the future don’t mean a thing, the one who is eternal, had to squeeze himself into man-years. He tells us each year on his birthday, on the New Years, on Ugadi, that the day and the celebration don’t mean much, that every day is his birthday, every year is a new year, every second is a new moment. Every moment is a new creation, every moment is a chance for liberation.

 

And yet, we fall into these routines – day after day, we follow them mechanically, thoughtlessly, mindlessly. We need to follow Swami’s advice of aligning ourselves in thought, word and deed. If we do that, our routines will become precious moments to look forward to – we will live in them thoughtfully and mindfully. This lesson couldn’t be more obviously taught by Swami himself – He who transcends time, follows a certain routine for the sake of his devotees, out of his immense love. Every morning and afternoon, he comes out for Darshan, his full love and attention focused on his devotees, one person at a time. Day after day, week after week, year after year, he’s been doing this since he was a mere teenager.

 

When He looks at me during Darshan, even for a split second, it feels like time stopped, like time is revolving around him and me. A second feels like eternity. His piercing gaze takes in all of my lifetimes. In that moment, time means nothing. Or in his words, “Time is but a drop in the ocean”. That drop, that moment is everything, the most precious.

 

When I try to take in the purport of his meaning, and apply it to my daily life, I have to rethink my routine, and pare it back to ONLY what makes sense. And then, to live in it, as if this moment is everything, to pour in my complete effort and attention to this moment. My lifetime is filled with moments. THIS moment is all that matters.