What is time?

FROM http://discovermagazine.com/2007/jun/in-no-time

"The possibility that time may not exist is known among physicists as the “problem of time.” It may be the biggest, but it is far from the only temporal conundrum. Vying for second place is this strange fact: The laws of physics don’t explain why time always points to the future. All the laws—whether Newton’s, Einstein’s, or the quirky quantum rules—would work equally well if time ran backward. As far as we can tell, though, time is a one-way process; it never reverses, even though no laws restrict it.

“It’s quite mysterious why we have such an obvious arrow of time,” says Seth Lloyd, a quantum mechanical engineer at MIT. (When I ask him what time it is, he answers, “Beats me. Are we done?”) “The usual explanation of this is that in order to specify what happens to a system, you not only have to specify the physical laws, but you have to specify some initial or final condition.” "

The article continues.....

"Einstein, for one, found solace in his revolutionary sense of time. In March 1955, when his lifelong friend Michele Besso died, he wrote a letter consoling Besso’s family: “Now he has departed from this strange world a little ahead of me. That means nothing. People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”

Rovelli senses another temporal breakthrough just around the corner. “Einstein’s 1905 paper came out and suddenly changed people’s thinking about space-time. We’re again in the middle of something like that,” he says. When the dust settles, time—whatever it may be—could turn out to be even stranger and more illusory than even Einstein could imagine. "

I frequently think about the nature of time, and the relationship between our consciousness and time/space.

Is our consciousness within time space, or is time/space within our consciousness?

I have concluded that time and space is within our consciousness.

When we embrace the reality that time and space are within our consciousness then the nature of the questions that we ask, and the answers we find are different.

Does time flow forward or backward? If the realm of time is within you, then what is forward and backward?

How does time relate to now? In now, does time exist?

Is time more than a mere thought form in the consciousness of now?

Do we need to determine the reality of time if we realize that in one reality it exists, on another it does not? Can't we just work with time where it appears real, and release the thought of time where time does not exist?

In the same way that light is neither a particle or a wave, time both exists and does not exist.

Time is the ever present now, in many forms.

Anyone talking about 2013?

I just read a string of comments from Erik Davis' piece about 2012 on http://www.realitysandwich.com. The comments are from some of the contributors and very well-informed people on the subject of 2012, and all of the lore, theories, misunderstandings, etc. surrounding the new age version of "the rapture."

Regardless of my view that much of the interest in 2012 is an attempt for our current sub-culture to find meaning and direction in this apocalyptic time, my intuition tells me that the Maya were really on to something. The research and study of people like John Major Jenkins and others appear to be grounded in clear minded study of the work, philosophy and practices of the Maya both ancient and modern-day in Guatamala.

Furthermore, he mentions an ancient Mayan site called Izapa which he calls "Stonehenge on steroids" in reference to its extremely sophisticated astronomical and mathematical attributes.

He states:

"My own focus is on reconstructing the original 2012 cosmology, utilizing data from the site that invented the 2012 calendar. That seems self-evidently worthwhile and reasonable enough, right? But how often do you hear Izapa mentioned in the same breath as 2012? Can the galactic alignment, which empirically occurs in the alignment zone 1980 to 2016 AD, trigger change and shifts in consciousness? I don't know, maybe. Why don't scientists take a look? Because they are so turned off by how the 2012 topic is constantly framed through distorted filters - scientists can't even get a handle on what the galactic alignment is. Kudos to Ben Anastas at the New York Times for framing the topic in, finally, a more or less accurate way, and giving some acknowledgment to the pioneering work I've done. Now, having said all that, in regard to the changes happening on the planet, isn't it interesting that the galactic alignment - a once in a 26,000-year alignment - happens during an exceedingly bizarre period of human history (1980 - 2016 AD)?"

I am heartened by his comments and his attempts to sift through all the noise and get to a clearer sense of what the Maya saw, and what it means - if anything for us today.

Naturally, it appears that humans are undergoing some form of evolutionary and transformative journey during this period of history. Mainly because we are becoming more and more aware of the negative impact we have on the life support system on the planet, and that in order to stop the damage we need to collectively shift into an entirely different mode of being. Doesn't it appear that we are in some form of "evolve or die" scenario?

What does this evolutionary shift consist of?

Almost every spiritual teacher who I have met has said some form of "The problems in our world are a projection of the problems inside our hearts and minds. If we deal with the inner world, the reality of the outer world will shift."

I have had a number of conversations with people who's wisdom I respect who have said more-or less the same that the hallmark of this time is that we are individually and collectively to do our "shadow work" to serve, and co-create this evolutionary experiment on our Mother Earth.

One of the conclusions that John Major Jenkins made is consistent with this - I'll let his words speak for themselves:

"The ancient Maya encoded into their traditions a belief that such a time would be attended by transformation and renewal, but, following the teaching in their creation myth, the outcome is ultimately a function of to what degree we, and all beings suffering from ego limitation, can sacrifice our illusions - the illusions that keep consciousness fixated to states of self delusion. That topic is best reserved for another day."

Well, today I would say that the work has always been here, 2012 or not. For most humans, regardless of where we have lived in this space/time map called Earth, the experience we create for ourselves is determined by the degree to which we can transcend our limitations and live in a more integrated/holistic/spiritual/evolved state of being.

Conversations and concerns about 2012, the Maya, prophecy, etc which do not include the basics of inner work are simply skipping across the surface.

John Major Jenkins subsequently wrote another article this week on 2012 and the role that Izapa played in forming the Mayan thought of 2012. He postulates that psychedelics played a significant role in shaping the cosmology of the Mayan, which interestingly echoes view similar to those of modern theoretical physics.

He writes "This philosophical model developed by Mesoamericans thinkers is actually extremely progressive, for modern physicists also describe a network of threadlike links between distant places, quantum “wormholes” in spacetime that tunnel through a higher dimension. Physicists even joke about making faster-than-lightspeed journeys to distant stars by accessing these holes in space."

"....What I’ve termed a “galactic cosmology” is named so not simply because it utilizes the galaxy as an armature of the sky’s shifting, but because it perceives human evolution from a heightened, enlarged, galactic level. After being lost for centuries, this galactic cosmovision is now reemerging. With its attendant spiritual teachings, it promises to help us restore our deep connection to nature, the universe, and our true selves."

Back to here/now - anyone talking about what we need to do today for 2013 and beyond? A question comes to mind - if the mayans were on to something, how are we to align with this phenomenon in ourselves and our world?

Or as Tyler Durden of Fight Club said "Evolve and let the chips fall where they may."

wisdom of crowds - Biomimicry of group behavior

A recent article in National Geographic by Peter Miller discusses something particularly important for this time - the power of community, crowds...

What is known as Swarm Theory recognizes that a large group of individual elements is far more intelligent than the individual components. "wisdom of crowds" as described in the 2004 book of the same title...

This is the power of organizing, of democracy, of the web, wikipedia, etc. Naturally there are many different faces of group behavior and the world is full of examples of group behavior which is less than positive.

Miller writes - "...an important truth about collective intelligence: Crowds tend to be wise only if individual members act responsibly and make their own decisions. A group won't be smart if its members imitate one another, slavishly follow fads, or wait for someone to tell them what to do. When a group is being intelligent, whether it's made up of ants or attorneys, it relies on its members to do their own part. For those of us who sometimes wonder if it's really worth recycling that extra bottle to lighten our impact on the planet, the bottom line is that our actions matter, even if we don't see how.

Think about a honeybee as she walks around inside the hive. If a cold wind hits the hive, she'll shiver to generate heat and, in the process, help to warm the nearby brood. She has no idea that hundreds of workers in other parts of the hive are doing the same thing at the same time to the benefit of the next generation.

'A honeybee never sees the big picture any more than you or I do,' says Thomas Seeley, the bee expert. 'None of us knows what society as a whole needs, but we look around and say, oh, they need someone to volunteer at school, or mow the church lawn, or help in a political campaign.'

If you're looking for a role model in a world of complexity, you could do worse than to imitate a bee."

Learning from an example of bees, is clear - the intelligence of the group can be far more than that of the individual. If the individuals comprising the group are all collectively in an "evolved state of mind" then the promise is that the group can change the larger system around it.

This premise, understanding is the positive side of the equation.

I recall hearing of TM meditators gathering in hotels in downtown Washington DC to meditate for days in order to shift the consciousness of the government. Many new-age and spiritual groups work with similar principals and ideas.

Consider the latest "Fire the Grid" as the latest incarnation of this thought....

Well, what does this all point to?

Hmmmm... only questions come to mind.

Is it possible that enough of us on a positive wavelength resonating together can shift the equation?

Yes. Of course.

The Sword of Discrimination - cutting through the mist and shed light on the shadow!

“When you find states of mind, feelings, and thoughts that bother you coming up again and again, these become the perfect target for you to address and remove from the fabric of your mind. This is a project you'll undertake when you finally come to a point where something has been bothering you for so long that you decide you're going to get to the bottom of it no matter what.

The sword of discrimination is the best way to remove these poisons from your system and extinguish them; take a ray of the light of the Bodhicitta, form it into a sword, and strike precisely at the poison's heart as if you were using a laser. Dealing with these very subtle poisons at the level of the mind when they first take form as a vibration is a skill you will develop. They'll have a form and feeling; emotional content and memory is attached to them.

This is something you should do a little bit every day. Make it a part of your meditation to deal with this kind of problem solving; you'll have phases where this will be all you'll do for an hour a day for an entire week. This is something you will have to do regularly; it's not like you'll ever come to the end of it.” -- Mark Griffin