Time

There was so much time before clocks and watches were invented.

Time has not been a friend to me this month. Mick and the Stones may have had time on their side (and judging by their age now, and longevity of career, seems to have held true for them), but I have not, lately.

Having a clunky, aging, dinosaur of a desktop for a digital darkroom and website workstation has certainly not aided me in trying to make up for lost time. It only slows down the workflow.

Not whining, just making an observation. But I had decided on the photo for my next blog post three weeks ago, the theme as well, and for various reasons, it has taken that long for the words to form, so here goes.

We had a pastor once, who talked one Sunday morning about what he called "the tyranny of the urgent". In a nutshell, what I took away from his sermon, and the thought that has stuck with me to this day so many years down the road, is that all those things we think are priorities-- things that seem urgent at the time-- oftentimes are either shallow distractions, or the tyranny of being subject to the agendas of others. In our efforts to prioritize, or to cram 32 hours into 24, or often in an effort to avoid what really matters ("Procrastination, my old friend/ I've come to talk with you again..." to paraphrase Simon and Garfunkel). Humans either obsess over organization and prioritizing, or they wrap themselves in the safety and comfort of procrastination. Either way, it is usually to the detriment or loss of the things that really matter.

Things like:

Our children

Our significant other

Our parents

Our life's calling

Really noticing beauty in the world around us

The thing or things that speak to our own souls and bring us true peace and happiness

"The tyranny of the urgent"....time is certainly a tyrant, and often we give priority and preference to things that in the bigger picture, in the long run, are not going to make a lick of difference in our lives at all. Nobody on their death beds says "Boy, I only wish I had spent more time working overtime", or "Geez, I wish I'd watched more TV", or "Man, I really regret that I didn't spend more time cleaning", or "If only I had tried harder to be 100% perfect in everything I did"....well, some people might. No, most people end their given time on this planet regretting that they didn't make room for things that really mattered, or for things they had dreamed of doing or trying. For some reason, we as humans feel it's a far more noble thing to give up our desires and dreams in an effort to [fill in your own personal "wish-I-hads" here] . We allow time to rule us, we allow time to claim our dreams and joys, we allow time to convince us that the things that really do matter are frivolous and selfish, when in fact, the opposite is true.

I have been a daydreamer and a creative all my life. as such, I have tended to be labeled lazy, or told to "grow up". When I have chosen to pursue something that spoke to my heart and soul, it was often seen as a waste of time or frivolous, and there was always someone around who was more than happy to point this out to me and place me on what they thought was a better path.We are conditioned as we grow older, to set aside the things that bring us pleasure, that feed our creative hearts, that make our world (and often others' worlds as well) a better, more tolerable place to dwell in. We are conditioned to believe that fun, or time spent doing nothing at all, or following one's dreams, are not for grownups. We are supposed to "grow up".

"And then one day you find/ Ten years have got behind you/ No one told you when to run/ You missed the starting gun...."

In a similar vein of thought, who are we to tell another how one's time ought best be spent? You aren't in that person's shoes. You aren't in their body. You may not share the same dreams or priorities, or see certain things as important. We are not a bunch of clones or cyborgs. Every person on this planet was created with a different heart, mind and soul. Who are we to judge another person's choice of priorities? I myself, while I covet the freedom to choose how my time away from the 40 hour work week is spent, constantly need to remind myself of this. And, there will be times when our priorities for ourselves need to be met, even when it doesn't fit someone else's agenda. That is when it gets difficult to discern which is more important, and the good ol' "tyranny of the urgent" arises. This one I haven't an easy answer for. But I do know for a fact, sometimes, we have to follow our own priorities, and do that which is good for our own soul. If you haven't tended to your own well-being (and sometimes that means feeding that creative drive, or soaking in a tub for an hour, or sitting on your butt doing nothing), you will certainly not be in any shape to take care of others' needs.

So, there's my thought for the week, which only took me three weeks to formulate. Take it as you like, maybe take it and dwell on it for yourself a bit. But Time is not a very friendly sort, and he will trick you out of all kinds of good life experiences, if you let him. So just remain aware of this, as your days go by. I have allowed Time to steal from me quite freely in the last three weeks. But I'm back on track again.