Working on Different Clocks

"Some things in life may change
And some things
They stay the same

Like time, there's always time
On my mind
So pass me by, I'll be fine
Just give me time." - Damien Rice, "Older Chests."

I don't know about you, but my summer went too quickly. I didn't waste it. I got a lot of reading done, but the speeding up of time is disturbing. As a culture we need to slow down and breathe a little bit.   

Some days I think a complete societal collapse will actually do us some good. Some of us can use the coming crisis to reflect on the course of our lives and readjust our inner clocks so that they match the rhythms of nature. Most of us are out of sync with the real world, especially people who constantly watch the horrible 24/7 cable channels that do a disservice to their minds and souls.

I always get mad at myself whenever I waste time because it really is the most precious resource. How we use our time says a lot about us and our character. What we spend our time on makes us who we are and who we will be in the future. I've thought about writing on the subject of time for the past month, and tie it into 9/11 truth. But what is there to be said about time that amazing novelists, poets, shamans, scientists, and philosophers haven't already said?

I searched the phrase "the tyranny of time" and there were 72,000 results, including this interesting 6-minute business lecture by Ron Baker called, "Escaping the Tyranny of Time."

A lot of movies revolve around the theme of time. In the 2010 film "Inception," time slows down the deeper and longer the dream goes. In the 2011 film "In Time," time is bought and sold.

Sociologists, psychologists, and neurologists have written many books on time. In this video, Professor Philip Zimbardo talks about his book "The Time Paradox: The New Psychology of Time That Will Change Your Life." 

Our relationship to time and how we manage it can change the course of our lives, relationships, careers, companies, and countries. Authors Paula Caligiuri, David Lepak, and Jaime Bonache wrote in their book, "Managing the Global Workforce":

"The importance and treatment of time. In cultures where time is controlled, time is treated as a commodity: It can be bought, spent, and wasted. The "time is money" maxim, attributed to the American statesman Benjamin Franklin, exemplifies this attitude; it is also prevalent in northern Europe and in China. In controlled time cultures, you will observe punctual public transportation, more people wearing (and looking at) watches, more clocks in public places, meetings with a fixed start and end time, and a greater use of agendas. In cultures where time is viewed to have more fluidity, such as the Middle East and South America, there is greater emphasis on people and how work is accomplished, as opposed to meeting and keeping deadlines. In fluid time cultures, you will observe people arriving beyond a scheduled time for social events and meetings, public transportation that does not adhere to a schedule, social events and meetings with a start time - but no end time.

As Geert Hofstede and his colleagues uncovered in his original research, cultures also differ according to their long-term and short-term time orientation. When one examines a long-range plan for a traditional Japanese firm (more past and future-oriented) the scope can extend both decades in the future and back in time to a deep connection to the founding principles of the firm. In contrast, the examination of a long-range plan for an American firm (traditionally more present-oriented) will be very short in scope (perhaps a few years, or even a few quarters). While the international markets are forcing publicly traded global firms to think more in the present, the time orientation is still a relevant cultural difference to consider." [Managing the Global Workforce. 2010. John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Chapter 4].

We all experience time differently depending on our circumstances, brain patterns, and a host of other different factors, some of which we have no control over and some that we do. 20th century writers James Joyce, Vladimir Nabokov, and Marcel Proust play with the nature of time in their novels. Diego Rincon wrote about the works of Proust and Nabokov in his essay, "Pale Fire and Swann's Way: A negation of time." Here is an excerpt:

"What is the experience of time? Broadly, it is the way our senses make us feel the flow of what has already happened into what is yet to be – the coming into being and fading away of things. The Past, Present and Future make up the basic building blocks of our experience of time: we live in the present (or rather the immediate past, for the light that comes into our eyes (or the sound, etc.) takes some time to reach our brain), but we are conscious of the past, and from it we construe the future. Moreover, memory –the ability of our brain to store, retain, and recall information– plays a vital role in the way we experience time. Indeed without Memory it would be impossible for us to keep track of the past, and, since Time gains its “texture” as a result of our consciousness of the past and we are only conscious of the past because we are able to store information from it, it would be safe to say that memory is the operator that acts upon ourselves and allows the experience of time. In the same way that the past is our memory’s database, the future is also the result of an operation on memory, namely that of prediction and induction."

The influence a totalitarian regime has over how the perception of time in society cannot be calculated, but it is significant. Rincon's points that, "memory is the operator that acts upon ourselves and allows the experience of time," and, "the past is our memory’s database," are crucial to understand. Under a totalitarian regime collective memory is manipulated, the past is managed, and even the flow of time is controlled.

II. Working on Different Clocks

In this article I propose there are three basic divisions of time: Narrative Time (historical, electoral, astrological), Being Time (sleep time, play time, work time, family time), and Spiritual Time (periods of intense depression, episodes of ecstasy and enlightenment). In addition to these divisions, there are four aspects of time: technical, physical, spatial, and psychological.

The technical aspect of time has to do with the basic mechanics of time and our understanding of its structure. When we think of time, we think of 1) past/present/future, and 2) hourly/daily/weekly/monthly/yearly. The physical aspect is also pretty self-explanatory. There is "workout time." For women, there is "pregnancy time." Etc. Examples of spatial time include "prison time," "movie time," "school time," "casino time," and "rehab time." In all these places, time is experienced differently.

The psychological aspect is the most interesting because it has many layers within it. There are many types of time. For example, "high time" is remembered by addicts, and they always return back to these intense periods of experiences. Soldiers go through "death time" when they come close to the edge of death in battle and return to the mainland.

Then there is "real time," a title of Bill Maher's HBO show. In real time (not referring to the show), social taboos and propaganda spin are sucked out and the truth enters. The conversation can either be of a political or a personal nature. Some people live in "real time" on a continuous basis because of the adrenaline it gives them, while others never step into "real time" because of the fear that their out-dated perceptions of reality and the world around them will undergo a transformation.

The fourth type of time is "revolutionary time." The people of Egypt experienced this time at Tahrir Square in February 2011. The intensity of their emotional and psychic lives were heightened during this period. "Revolutionary time" can last a few weeks or a few years, as during the American and French revolutions.

The fifth type of time is "emergency time" or "coup time," a term coined by author Naomi Wolf, who said it in an interview with TalkingStickTV in October 2008, after the controversial bank bailout by the Bush administration. "We have to speed up our reflexes because we are in police state time. We are in coup time," said Wolf. 

The sixth type of time is "war time." In war time, the state is boss and the citizen is a slave. Governments love "war time" because they can pass fascist legislation and stifle dissent under the cover of patriotism. 

The seventh and final type of time is "end times." This is a special kind of time because it comes rarely for civilizations. They are marked by complex crises. "End times" do not mark the end of the world but the end of a way of living and a way of experiencing time. 

End times are also "awakening times." During these periods, different people work on different clocks. Rulers feel separated from the common people more than ever. The way "Narrative Time" is experienced by different levels of society in "End Times" is really amazing. There are ten kinds of "Narrative Time."

III. Narrative Time

1) Astrological Time: Astrologers have influenced the course of cultures, empires, and civilizations for thousands of years. Masters of astrological time are masters of worlds and destinies. To get a sense of the influence of astrological time on social and political movements, watch this lecture by author Richard Tarnas called, "Our Moment In History: World Transits 2008-2020."

2) Historical Time: Statesmen, military leaders, and philosophers deal in historical time. They see the future and plan for it. Of course, there are always surprises, new technological inventions, and social developments that turn our conception of the future upside down. But, generally, people who have their hands on historical time can prepare for big changes.

3) Electoral Time: In Western democracies, elections that come around every two or four years are meaningless in the grand scheme of things. The course of general trends and the influence of dominant philosophies is not changed. An upstart politician like Barack Obama can successfully channel the energies of the people into his campaign and keep up their hopes, but he cannot reform giant bureaucracies. People who pay attention to things like the DNC and the RNC are stuck in electoral time. They are unaware of the existence of the other types of Narrative times.

4) Technological/Digital Time: A day spent on the computer is so much different than a day spent under a tree by a lake. Quality matters. Digital time is compressed, and the richness of time is diminished. There is a danger in our culture that too many people, including myself, do not balance digital time with other times.

Digital Time is a "Narrative Time" because it overtakes a person's daily surrounding and sense of personal history so much that he/she cannot live without coming in contact with it on a regular basis. People who text while driving or post everyday on Facebook and Twitter are the perfect examples of this new social phenomenon. Almost all of us live in digital time. It is hard to escape. But if you want to get out and run for the hills, there are digital rehabs.

5) Financial Time: Bankers live in their own universe, which operates on its own conception of time and morality. We've all seen these guys on the floor of the stock market running around like maniacs. Western societies have been captured by Financial Time. Privately owned central banks have an unnatural control over the economy, and, by extension, how we spend our time. Check out the book, "Boom and Bust BankingThe Causes and Cures of the Great Recession," edited by David Beckworth about the dangerous influence of corrupt monetary policies on the growth and decline of entire economies.

6) National Time: This kind of time is connected to political constructions of national memory, and the history of a country. Revolutions change the fundamental nature of national time because they cause a complete break with the past. For example, Iran has two different historical calendars, an ancient Zoroastrian one, and an Islamic one, but it still functions under its original national conception of time. For a better explanation, read what Massoume Price wrote in his article, "Iranian Calendar Systems, History and Origins":

"The present calendar resulted from a reform conducted in 1079 by a group of astronomers headed by the great Iranian mathematician and poet Omar Khayyam. The origin of the calendar is however much older. It goes back to the Persian Achaemenian period in the 6th century BC. The Islamic lunar calendar was widely used till the end of the 19th century. However since Pahlavi period the more accurate solar calendar is used throughout the country and has remained the official system despite the Islamic revolution. During Pahlavi period the Arabic months used extensively were abandoned and once again the ancient Persian names were revived and are still in use today."

7) Personal Time: Personal growth drives cultural evolution and historical transformations. People who do not change with the times are left behind. It is important for individuals to concentrate on their own inner growth and change and not so much on national revolutions and historical transformations.

8) Military Time: NATO is fighting the current war in Afghanistan on a timeline that is completely different from the one that is mentioned in public. They call it the "Long War." Military time is in perpetual conflict with electoral time. The military-industrial complex has been at war with the American republic for over half a century, and the crisis will intensify in this decade if current trends continue.

9) Seasonal Time: No explanation needed.

10) Ecological Time: Environmental leaders say they are working on the Earth's clock. They are not guided by electoral time, or even historical time. Their understanding of ecological time may be out of whack, especially climate change alarmists, but no one can stop them from operating on ecological time rather than other Narrative times.

All of these different "Narrative Times" are in conflict. People experience the evolution of history and cultural change differently in "Historical Time" as opposed to "Electoral Time." For example, a sprint to tyranny in Historical Time is experienced as a lap around the track of democracy in Electoral Time.

The true believers who attended the RNC and DNC are oblivious to the dangers of laws like the NDAA because such laws only exist in Historical Time, not Electoral Time. They are fixated on the cycle of elections, not the cycles of history.

The people who listen to Alex Jones live in Historical Time; the people who attend the DNC and RNC live in Electoral Time. They cannot carry on a conversation with each other because spiritually and mentally they live in two different time zones. There is no connection. The wires have been cut, and the line is dead.

Other examples of conflicts are, "Ecological Time vs. Financial Time; Historical Time vs Personal Time; and Military Time vs Seasonal Time."

What does this article have to do with 9/11 truth? People who wake up to the truth about 9/11 escape the emptiness of "electoral time" and enter the urgency of "historical time," "real time," and "coup time." Adjusting to the new time is painful. When one's previous sense of time is replaced with the new time and the new reality the world itself takes on a new shape and colour.

Since our schizophrenic political culture in the West refuses to recognize the legitimacy of 9/11 truth there is no mainstream feedback to those who have awakened to the new "coup time."

People who deny the truth about 9/11 are living in lost time because they have lost contact with truth and reality. And the "mainstream" media has no time for 9/11 truth-tellers because it exists in a place beyond time. Or maybe it exists in a land before time.