Time is an Illusion

It was a bit hard for me to digest the idea that the past, present, and future coexist as one. I mean, how can yesterday be present and the future exist today? Though a lot of teachers have said that time is just an illusion, yet I still can’t grasp that idea since we are used to living in a world where people, events, and all circumstances are subject to time itself. They reiterate that we carry with us our past and future in our present moment and that the only time that exist is now.

Suddenly, I had an ‘epiphany’ allowing me now to realize why yesterday and tomorrow do not exist after all. It was easy for me to understand that tomorrow does not exist since it has not happened yet, but, yesterday? It took place and some things are ‘left’ there in that past. Yet again, the past doesn’t exist. In order for us to grasp why is this so, we need to look at things in an observer’s perspective.  Allow me to provide a sample scenario.

Let us say you are meeting your friend John tonight in a coffee shop since John will be leaving next morning for a business trip to  the Middle East. You had an awesome conversation and parted ways past 11PM. Both of you went home, slept, and John got up early for his flight. Indeed, both of you had coffee yesterday. 

Now, let us look at the same scenario through a third-person perspective who happens to be looking at both individuals from a distance, say, as far as the moon. Let us name the third person, Fred. Fred sees you having coffee with John. He sees both of you parting ways past 11PM, both slept, and John flies after. As the earth rotates, some part is slowly covered in darkness while the other is starting to have its daylight. Fred simply sees that the world is just revolving and having its so called night and day for various parts of the world. He witnesses everything that is happening in the current moment.  For him, there was no yesterday, there was no tomorrow. Everything is just happening now, and right in front of him, as if a car just passes by from one point to the other. Yet, in your perspective, the ‘night’ that you had coffee with John, was yesterday.

Time indeed, does not exist. We carry with us our past, and the future is also just an illusion. The only time we have is now for, in this reality, we are living in a world where the past, present, and future coexist as one.  

Namaste.

-The Lost Monk