Zen Time

You may suppose that time is only passing away, and not understand that time never arrives. Although understanding itself is time, understanding does not depend on its own arrival. People only see time's coming and going, and do not thoroughly understand that the time-being abides in each moment.

from Zen Master Dogen's essay "Being Time"

The problem with time is that it appears to be moving in a certain direction. That is, until we will it, through things like Daylight Savings Time, to move the opposite way.

And of, people tend to think they know what time is. As if the question "What is time?" never occurred to them.

Whatever it is, there's clearly constant change in the relative, everyday world. Certainly, this body of "mine" has grown, and gotten older over the last thirty six years. And when I look around, everything else has shifted as well, even if only in tiny ways. But it's not the whole story. How could it be?

The thing is, each of us is a "time-being" in each moment. Inside the movement of life is also a timelessness not separate from that movement.

I think a lot of the resistance I feel to whatever is happening in the now comes from forgetting this timelessness. Being disembodied in some manner or another. Literally out of touch.

That's about all I have to say at this time.

Any thoughts?

Joys of Our Ancestors

I remember sitting with my great grandmother two summers ago on the back porch, chatting a little bit and mostly, sitting in silence listening to the birds. When we did talk, the conversation was basic. Nothing really "profound" was said. And there was a sharing that went beyond words, regardless of whether we were talking or not. I'm not sure I ever asked great grandma what she though of the world today, and she's gone now. However, I know that one of her favorite things to do was to play cards with family and fiends. Sitting around a table chatting, goofing off, and occasionally cheating (more than once, that needed ace or king "magically" appeared from under the table) - that was the good life to her. Nothing fancy. No designer gadgets. No virtual game systems. Sound systems.

If we don't remember the joys of our ancestors, we'll lose apart of ourselves. Our lives cross all of space and time, if only we'd let them.