Reflections From a Murky Pond

Some days, and many more nights, it strikes me odd how we humans make arbitrary divisions of time. We as a species compartmentalize time into a plethora of units that have no bearing upon anything but how we perceive time and level set our goals.

This has no bearing upon the greater reality but seems essential the working of the human mind.

A more fluid and/or holistic view of time actually seems detrimental to our happiness and sanity. Without these goal points in time that we’ve created we seem to descend into depression, frustration, and madness in fairly short order.

This strikes me as both odd and counter-survival oriented. It does seem to be the way we’re built though.

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Both as individuals and as societies we seem very concerned with ourselves and our importance. Each crisis is of horrific magnitude because it impacts us and the world we’ve created with our perceptions and imagining to surround us.

At times it is beneficial to be given a reminder – hopefully a gentle one – that much of this is illusory, and what isn’t, is likely transitory. The universe will continue its stately precession to oblivion long after we and everyone we ever loved or hated has long since died and been forgotten.

While humbling, this should also be a source of comfort for us. True, all of our efforts will eventually come to naught and be erased from the fabric of the universe by the erosion of time. Yet, so too will the effects of the efforts of our enemies and the consequences of our failures fade away, leaving not a trace of themselves upon the universe.

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Do you ever wonder where your life went and/or how you spent your life and upon what? By that I mean do you ever wonder to what your life went and in what portions?

I’m not speaking of some sort of “midlife crisis,” nor am I speaking of the slow, measured pacing from birth to grave that is governed by the implacable cadences of time and entropy. I’m speaking of this in a more Einsteinian relativistic manner based on the perception of time, interest or passion, and effort.

If you spend two hours speaking with a beautiful woman, you feel, at the end of the two hours that you’ve spent only two minutes with her; while if you spend two minutes sitting on hot tin, you feel you’ve spent two days!

– Albert Einstein
Explaining the Theory of Relativity

Throughout our existence we spend our lives, either actively or passively, in various pursuit. Whether we have so profligately or miserly it is the same; we have, through our efforts and attention or inattention, spent the measure of our respective spans on the things we have done, thought of, and cared about.

Do you consider these things and how you’ve spent your time pursuing them? If so, by what measure or by what scales do you measure them to tally them up so as to determine the return on your investment.

Do you ever wonder if the Gods have their own scales and measures and if they in their turn measure our return in their investment of our lives?

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