Time

A valuable commodity?

Every second is of infinite value.- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Do you have time? What time is it? I don’t have time for this. Time’s running out. Our speech is peppered with such expressions.

I used to believe that time was a very precious commodity. It demanded that we be efficient and effective. We had to set goals and achieve objectives. We had to meet our forecast. That is the way of the world, right?

What would you do if you were given $86,400 every day to spend? You could buy whatever you wanted. The only stipulation is that by the end of the day, you must spend all of it. Any amount you don’t spend is lost forever. However, the next day you will be given another $86,400, and the next day and the next day, for the rest of your life. Sounds good, doesn’t it?

It’s a true story if you change those dollars into seconds.

We are each given 86,400 seconds every 24 hours to do with as we please. But we know that we don’t have an infinite number of them, or do we?

I used to think that we had only so much time. Our lives may last 65 or 75 or even 100 years, but sooner or later we die; we run out of time.

I no longer believe that.

Yes, we die, but who’s to say that is the end? It has been known for over 2,000 years that death is not the end. It is merely the final event in this phase of our existence.

No one knows for sure what happens to us after we die, but one thing is abundantly clear: our consciousness, our essence, our soul continues to exist. Millions of people who have had Near Death Experiences (NDEs) attest to this. They have died, many were even pronounced dead and taken to the morgue, yet they came back to life and tell amazing stories about what they experienced.

I now believe that upon death we enter into a timeless realm. We find it hard to imagine a world without time. Being creatures who have always existed in time, we have no way of understanding what a place without time would be like.

Nonetheless, I enjoy speculating.

Without time, there is no way to measure change. Yesterday, today and tomorrow all blend into one. We no longer grow old.

We could have breakfast with King Tut, lunch with Julius Caesar and dinner with Einstein; we could then play a round of golf with Arnold Palmer (and beat him), go for a long walk on the seashore, visit our cabin in the mountains, go fly fishing, swim in a cool (not ice cold) mountain lake, take a cruise around the world and still have plenty of “time” to do whatever else we wanted to do.

We could read all of the posts on Medium (and every other platform), visit the Library of Congress and read all the books, tour the Louvre and even visit all the other museums of the world.

Having perfect, youthful “bodies,” we’d have plenty of energy to do all those things and more.

We could travel at the speed of thought and absorb new information as a dry sponge absorbs water. We’d have no problem understanding complex ideas and remembering important facts.

In the next realm, there will be no pain, no sorrow, no sadness. We will know only happiness, joy, and bountiful, unconditional love.

Our loved ones, past, present, and future will be there. We’ll be able to communicate with them without speaking. Thoughts will be instantly shared.

People say that imagination is a powerful thing. I believe that. The next life will be determined largely by what we imagine it to be. That’s one of the reasons I’ve spent a fair amount of time thinking about what it will be like, what I’d like it to be like. It prepares me for the “end”, which draws nearer each day. But I believe it also builds that future home.

I do all this imagining knowing that the future world will be far grander and much better than anything I can imagine.

And if it’s not?

Well, I’ve had a lot of fun imagining and building my castle in the sky. (Well, actually, it’s a rustic cabin on a stream in the forest that looks out over a beautiful meadow with towering mountains in the distance, a view inspired by the Grand Tetons.)

So, I no longer think in terms of each day having 86,400 seconds. Rather, I think of an endless stream of days punctuated by one on which I’ll cease to exist in this world and begin to exist in the next.

I no longer feel rushed. Once this life is over, there will be plenty of “time” to do whatever I’ve missed doing. I can continue working on my “bucket list” forever. I can even add to it as I go along.

In fact, I’ve put off doing many of the things on my current “bucket list” knowing that it will be much easier to do them once I have that new, healthy “body”. And, if it doesn’t turn out the way I imagined it? No regrets.

I used to watch my grandmother reading her Bible every day as the end of her life drew near. Once, I asked her what she was reading. She told me she was reading about heaven and the Pearly Gates. She said it was a beautiful place. She was preparing herself for that final journey out of this life into the next.

I’ve read the Bible many times and know what it says about heaven. However, I like to listen to my contemporaries who have gone into the next world and returned. They offer more up-to-date, modern descriptions. They have amazing stories to share. They provide content for my guidebook to the hereafter.

Of course, some are fabrications, but many have the ring of truth. Some reveal facts that can be and have been verified.

Those stories spark my imagination and provide an old man with many pleasant thoughts as I design and build my cabin in the woods.

I realize these are the ramblings of a retired 75 year-old who’s well into his Golden Years, but time is relative. Einstein showed that. It depends on the observer and how fast he or she is moving relative to that which is being observed. Maybe it also depends on how old we are and how fast our life is winding to a close.

I don’t expect young people to get this. When I was younger I had places to go, people to see, things to get done. Now I have time to sit and ponder. I love living life serendipitously. When I got up this morning, I had no idea what I would do today other than spend some quiet time and then sit down at the computer and see what Medium and other sites and my imagination came up with.

This is the product. I hope you found something in it to inspire you and perhaps get you to think differently.

Below, I’ve included links to a couple of other articles that you may find interesting.

Happy Reading, Writing, Imagining, and Connecting!