13 - H4H News: How is the Ego a Time Tyrant?

Synopsis: Hope for Humanity News is a series of three to five-minute weekly podcasts designed to educate, inspire, and comfort listeners during these challenging, but hopeful times. 

Hi everyone! Welcome to Hope for Humanity News! I’m Reverend Joan Kistler.

We’ve been talking about how the ego uses a variety of methods to pull us away from the present moment – including judgment, anger, fear, and guilt. At the end of our last broadcast, we suggested that the ego also uses time.

How does the ego use time?

Actually, the ego creates the illusion of time.  It accomplishes this by reviewing the past and imagining the future. But both past and future do not exist in reality. The only time we ever really have is now.

To a certain extent, there’s a functional use for time in our human experience. Clocks are useful to coordinate our activities with others. Thinking about the past is useful for learning and thinking about the future is useful for planning to a certain extent.

But the ego is pathologically obsessed with time – and that makes sense since the present moment is such a threat. The present moment is such a treat because when we relax into the present, both the ego and time disappear. When we are present, all thoughts about “me” and “how my life is going” disappear, so thoughts about the past and future naturally disappear with them.

You see, unless the present moment contains something that makes the ego the center of attention, it doesn’t want anything to do with it. And much of ordinary life is – well – ordinary. The ego loves drama, and if there’s no drama, the ego creates it by telling us stories – “once upon a time….”

The ego is a time tyrant. It makes us feel like there’s never enough time to do what we need to do, and no matter what we are doing, there’s always something more important that we should be doing. As a result, we always feel like we need to rush through things to get to the next thing.

The ego’s time tune sounds something like this: (Play The William Tell Overture).

As far as Essence is concerned, there is no next thing. There’s only what is happening now, and what is happening now is always wonderful – so wonderful that Essence wants to savor everything about it – even what the ego might judge as “bad.” Essence even loves challenges for the spiritual growth it brings.

Essence’s time tune sounds something like this: (Play The William Tell Overture).

Now that we know some key differences between ego and Essence, how can we learn to tune out the ego and tune into Essence? Well, one way is by practicing mindfulness.

What is mindfulness?

Tune in next week.