Time

Some of us are always keeping time, some finding time, some making time, some spending time, some catching up with time, some fighting for time, some arriving early and some running late. Some are having a good time, some going through bad times, some rising at an auspicious time, some abstaining from activities at an inauspicious time, some doing things at the right time, some arriving on the dot, some remembering the good old times and some looking forward to better times.

Some are clocking hours, some counting days, some dying for time and some say they have no time to die! Strange that this man-made clock-time seems so real and has such a sway over us.

Time is a concept created and sustained by the mind. We divide it into the past and future with reference to the present. However, the past and future are known to us only in the present. When the past occurred, it occurred as the present and when the future occurs, it will occur only as the present.

Therefore the present, this moment here and now, is the very essence of time. Ignoring this essence, is not all discussion on the past and future laughable, like counting without the number one?

Thus to live in the past or future is to deny the very essence of time and life, the here and now.… The present too is timeless and therefore beginningless and endless. The essence of the present is the pure Presence or Awareness, the ‘I’ that gives existence to the very concept of time. This presence or ‘I’ can only be experienced here and now, never as ‘there’ or ‘then’. ‘I am’ is the essence of all our experiences.
_{Swamini Vimalananda Saraswati, Meditation Techniques}