Stretchy time ~ Buddhist time management tips

Do you ever feel that however many items you check off, there’s still not enough time in any given day, in fact the to-do list seems to be getting longer? My barista in this Denver cafe literally just said to me as I sat down to post this: “I’ve been seriously meaning to get along to those meditation classes, but every month seems to fill up so fast and I can’t find time. I need to find time!”

Is life in general going faster than you expected, meaning you’re not getting all you wanted done?! Or that, let alone your own, even other people’s unmet needs and expectations weigh upon your soul?

Despite the hundreds of time-saving gadgets our ancestors never dreamed of, this is a common complaint of modern life. There isn’t time for worldly chores for starters, and then there isn’t time left over for our meditation practice; and this is sufficiently frustrating to make anyone want to escape to the time-suck that is Netflix …

If any of this is the case, we need to learn about stretchy time …

Carrying on from this article: Beyond the clock: Dharma and the space-time continuum. This article is going to be a mixture of straightforward-practical and philosophical-but-still-hopefully-practical.

How to keep our head above water

As it says in the article I was talking about, Burned out? Start here:

We really feel an extreme pressure — from inside and from the culture and from all sorts of sources — to overcome our built-in limitations. To fit more into the time that we have than anyone ever could. To exert more control over how things unfold. Because we feel that we must just to keep our heads above water in the modern world.

These pressures that we’re drowning in, where are they coming from? What would Buddha say? He stands alongside us – still in every sense of the word – as we run in ever-speedier circles on those treadmills, and suggests that we take a break to be more present, the only moment there is, and notice our timeless inner peace. He encourages us to look inside us and see the truth, that everything depends on thought, and this means everything – including space, time, productivity, expectations, and all the to-do lists ever invented. That checking off all the to-do lists in the world can never bring us closer to control, productivity, or happiness than can getting stuff done in virtual reality or a dream. But that learning to live within the truth of impermanence and emptiness will mean this is okay, better than okay, for we’ll have all the time and space in the world.

A New York minute

Someone in NYC back in January told me their partner had finally retired from counselling, a job that over 30 years has seen them burned out on a regular basis, overwhelmed, always running after the proverbial bus. P is already planning retirement activities and her partner was saying she has to be careful not to overextend herself again since it is such a habit. “P has so much energy!” she added, which is really saying something for a New Yorker – they all seem to have so much energy as far as I’m concerned, it’s exhausting just watching them.

Another long-term New York friend observed that although he and his husband love their lives they are still going to start spending 3 months a year in Italy – why? because “people are not in a hurry there, so you feel part of community. Here, there is no time to stop and smell the roses (even if you can find any).”

Fast paced, urgent, the hustle stereotypical to New York reminds me of something another New York friend once told me, “No one moves to New York to sit on the couch and watch TV.” I love New York for the people – I find them brilliant and they know that. Whenever I want help with anything, I ask one of my New Yorker friends ‘cos I know it’ll get done by yesterday. If I want to be guaranteed an interesting conversation, likewise. But I don’t envy the relentless pace of life. In the case of this friend, P plans on doing more meditation retreat and Buddhist teaching with her retirement, in which case her energy will be put to great use. She says she just needs to drop the internal pressure to be always on the go, understanding that this does not equal achievement.

Americans in general seem to have this “productivity debt”:

the feeling that so many of us have when we wake up in the morning feeling like we have to output a certain amount of work in order to justify our existence on the planet.

This might have something to do with the Protestant work ethic, which (wearing my British hat for a moment) we shipped out here on the Mayflower. In any event, if we have this feeling, then of course whatever we do is never going to be enough.

Stretched too thin

That article continues:

But I say that we can’t, because there are built-in limitations. There’s always going to be more that you could meaningfully do with your time than the time you have to do it.

Built-in limitations, indeed. This is true of worldly life, but it can also seem true of spiritual life, can it not? Even when just trying to help people, I was thinking how thin I can feel stretched when I don’t have the right state of mind. It seems people can be relying on us and we have to focus on them one at a time, during which time the others are left out in the cold. For example, I was in London over Christmas, then Colorado, then New York, then back to Colorado, then Florida, and now back to Colorado, and I try to focus on the people around me, but what of those I’ve left behind? (And my travel schedule is nothing compared to that of some folk I know.)

My answer?

Prayer

Well, for one thing, let’s remember our loved ones in our prayers – prayers are effective if we believe in them. Lots more about that in this and other articles on this blog: The power and purpose of prayer.

Keep your eye on the prize

For another, my frustration at not being able to be present for everyone can re-inspire me to become an omniscient Buddha so that I can be everywhere all the time, in the meantime remembering to see people as not outside of my mind so that I can carry them with me. This is because our real built-in limitations are delusions and mistaken appearances. If we have a Tantric practice, we can do all this by staying in the mandala.

Rejoicing

I also find it helpful to rejoice in – ie, feel happy about – all my fellow Buddhists and other super kind folk who are there for those I’m not there for in person, including in my family and in Dharma centers all over the world. If we’re all part of the same team, we get a lot more done; and so rejoicing helps us experience getting a lot more done!

One example: do I feel inadequate or even resentful that Foster Cari, who runs my foster outfit, is saving hundreds of cats every month while the only cat I am helping right now is the three-legged Melody? (Anyone want to adopt a limping but ever so chatty cat?!) No, of course, it’s not like that – how can Cari’s activities make me anything but glad given that we want the same thing, ie, safe and happy cats? This is the same for other Sangha and Centers, we are all doing this together so their successes are our successes. (More on rejoicing here Lay down your burden.)

Perspective

I also find it helpful, when starting to feel overwhelmed, to ask myself, “Will this urgent task matter in a year, a month, or even a week?” And, “Can I even remember what I was feverishly working on a year, a month, or even a week ago?!” Can you?! Let alone the question: “How meaningful will this activity seem to me when I am lying on my deathbed?”

Transcending ordinary perceptions of space and time

To continue the philosophical discussion of time management in the context of the space-time continuum, started here …

It’s probably not necessary to know all the technical equations of space and time unless we’re scientists; but it’s helpful to know enough about their conventional and ultimate natures to transcend ordinary, restrictive, crunchy perceptions of them. For time and space are interdependent and fluid, like a rainbow, and if we could realize that we’d be so very relaxed yet productive all day long. Studying and thinking about emptiness is by far the best investment of our time because we will get more than enough stretchy time back in return.

Human beings who haven’t realized emptiness see what doesn’t exist and do not see what does exist. For example, we see things as permanent (or undergoing slow change) and not that they change moment by moment. And we see things as independent and objective and not that they depend 100% on each other and on the mind. No wonder we fall into so much deep water!

Everywhere we look we perceive mind-generated versions of everything; all reality is subjective. However hard we search, we’ll never find a real world out there at all, good or bad, even correct or incorrect. I talk more about that here: No Buddhism. Everyone reading this article for example has your own version of it and, for that matter, of the writer and of yourselves; and where is the article etc other than these versions? Even the observer mind doesn’t exist objectively but depends on its objects and its moments, for example. If you read this article again in a month, it may appear, and be, completely different. A growing understanding of emptiness leads to increasing flexibility, creativity, and freedom because we understand that by transforming our thoughts we literally transform our world.

Dependent relationship

Everything is relational, not objective. Things exist and change only relative to each other. In Buddhism we say that things exist relative to their causes, parts, basis of imputation, name, and conceptual imputation – the five types of dependent relationship. (See The New Heart of Wisdom.)

For example, a rose depends on its seed – it is not that seed, but take the seed away and the rose disappears. A rose depends on its petals – it is not those petals, but take the petals away and the rose disappears. A rose depends on its basis of imputation, its parts – it is not the basis of imputation, but take this away and the rose disappears. A rose depends on its name – it is not that name, but take the name away and the rose disappears.

If we understand these four, we can understand the fifth most subtle type of dependent relationship, that a rose depends on imputation by thought – it is not conceptual imputation, but take that conceptual imputation away and the rose disappears. Another way of understanding this: the rose depends on mere appearance – it is not mere appearance, but take the mere appearance away and the rose disappears.

So there’s not much there to grasp on to! As Venerable Geshe-la put it:

Things barely exist.

The rose being dependent related in these five ways is its conventional nature and the disappearance or mere absence of the rose is its ultimate nature. And you can’t have one without the other. This applies to every impermanent phenomenon, which is most of the things we think about and interact with. And, as I mentioned here, it’s fun to meditate on these five types of dependent relationship for time and space.

Finding time

Time, first. There’s a case for understanding “time” as past, present, and future; or cause and effect; or impermanence. None of these exists outside of things, they are characteristics of impermanent phenomena.

Let’s use impermanence – you can choose gross or subtle impermanence. Impermanence clearly depends on causes. It also depends on parts – the impermanence of the rose, the petals, the stem, the observer, etc. It depends on a basis of imputation. It depends on name. It depends on conceptual imputation. For example, a rainbow arises and ceases newly moment by moment in dependence upon causes and conditions, and stringing its moments together is done entirely by our mind. Or the stills of a movie are strung together by our imputation to give the illusion of movement. The only continuation is what we impute as continuation.

Impermanence is none of these things – causes, parts, etc – but take any of them away and there is no impermanence. Time is therefore unfindable, empty, and entirely dependent on thought.

Finding space

What about space? Let’s take produced space, the space we see around us, the space that is made of atoms and changes color at night. Space depends on its causes – for example, if I move over to the next chair, there is now space where I was sitting that was not there before, and the space currently next to me is now filled up. It depends on its parts – for example, the space in this café and the space outside of the big blue sky. It depends on its basis of imputation. It depends on its name. And, if we realize all that about it, we’ll see that space does not exist from its own side in the slightest and therefore is not other than mere appearance, dependent on conceptual imputation or thought.

That might feel like enough philosophy for one article! But I can’t stop here …

What’s all the hurry?

Time and space also depend entirely on each other and are therefore not independent or objective. I was talking in that earlier article about meeting a friend at the Moma, let’s call him Brian – to do this, I need not just Brian’s location but the time he’ll be there. In other words, x, y, z, t all depend on each other – if we look for them existing in and of themselves, they’ll simply disappear into emptiness, their true nature.

Things move in time and space only relative to each other – we can observe this on a gross level, eg, seeing the landscape whizz by when we’re on a train; and this is even more the case at subtler levels of impermanence. X, y, z, t also depend on the observer, such as the observer in the carriage.

We may see Brian at that time and location, but where and when is he really? Where and when is that landscape? Where and when are space and time in a dream? That’s what we do in samsara, we think we are just moving through space and time that it is all around us, outside us, objective. But it is all projected, like a dream. So what, really, is the hurry? Where and when are we all hurrying up to be!?

How will this help me stretch time?!

How is this practical?! you may be wondering. To which I’d reply: I am probably not explaining this clearly enough, for which I apologize, but I still recommend you try out meditating on the dependent relationship of time and space just to see what happens. See if it helps release your grasping at limited or even problematical time and space. See how you are creating time and space with your own thoughts, so that if you don’t like what you’re creating, you now have the chance to create something new. That you have the power to expand space and time.

Letter BAM expanding

For the Tantric practitioners amongst you, I don’t think that we can engage successfully in the first bringing without some understanding that time and space are empty, that we can expand our BAM-mind or HUM-mind to the infinite edges of time and space, and beyond, because this is only a thought away. There is no real, fixed, objective time and space out there and consciousness over here. Rather, they arise and disappear together. More on Tantra here: Highest Yoga Tantra: space odyssey.

Over to you

I’d love to hear how you get on, including any wise comments from seasoned practitioners who’ve been experimenting with this kind of meditation for years.