I have been having interesting experiences with time inrecent weeks, as I have been without a reliable watch. My old watch starteddoing odd things – losing time, stopping, starting again, and generally playingup – some weeks ago. Wearing one that is unreliable is worse than not wearingone at all, as it can mislead you, so I have often just left it off and hopedto be able to catch random clocks and the car clock when I needed to know thetime. On taking my watch to a jeweller, I was informed that it wasn’t thebattery this time – the watch was certainly on its way out, bless. It was onlya cheap watch and it has done sterling service for nearly ten years, so I canhardly complain. Now it’s been assigned to the watch and clock graveyard in thesky, and I have had to buy myself a new watch.
However, the experience of not having a reliable watch hasbeen very interesting. I have been enjoying life without a watch, I have tosay, and because my normal way of living life is to flow with what is, thishasn’t been a problem, as long as I look at my diary every morning and make amental note of what needs to be done, and remember where I need to bethroughout each day, peeping at the odd clock or my phone when necessary. And theUniverse has prompted me on a few occasions, when I was needing to be somewherefairly sharp-ish and in danger of being late. Sometimes I have had to estimatewhat time it was, and have been amazed that my perception of how much time haspassed has been so inaccurate! It does seem, in my experience, that the furtherinto the right side of the brain we are, the less we are able to perceive time accuratelyin 3D. This is certainly the case during a gongbath, when the gong soundscatapult us into the right brain meditative state, and we lose all sense oftime. Then we often come too at the end thinking that only a few minutes havepassed, when the gongbath actually lasted 45 or 50 minutes! This is a very commonexperience among gongbath attendees.
We rely so much on time in modern life. We say things like –“there is not enough time”, or “I haven’t the time”, or “ring me next week whenI’ve got more time to chat”. We tend to be governed by the clock, certainly inthe Western world. Most of us have work to do, appointments to keep, meetingsto attend - and in my case workshops to teach and clients to treat - so a watchis really an essential to make sure that we turn up at the right time for ourcommitments. How do we balance being in the present moment and allowingeverything to flow, versus being able to operate efficiently in daily life whenwe have a schedule to keep to, i.e. the balancing between the right and leftsides of the brain? Well, that’s where a watch comes in very handy! Having hadthis watch-less experience for a while, I am now not checking my wrist nearlyso often, and finding that for most of the day I am flowing with the momentquite happily without missing appointments! But on the other hand I am alsoenjoying being able to know exactly what time it is when really necessary by againhaving my own reliable little clock on my wrist. It really is a balance, likeeverything else in life. If we are governed by clock time that can be stressfuland curtail our freedom considerably. And people who are always “slaves to time”are usually not happy people – it’s not a natural way to live. Conversely, ifwe are always “out there” and not grounded in our earth reality, it’s difficultto function in everyday life. Let’s find a balance, and then we can enjoy lifein all its rich experience, both practical and esoteric, flowing with what is,and enjoying the freedom that comes with not always “watching the clock”.
