Time travel is not only possible, but you do it all the time. I know you might believe that time travel is just some Sci-fi concept dreamt up by H.G. Wells for entertainment purposes, but I beg to differ.
Don’t stop reading now… let me prove it to you.
In any given moment, within the confines of your head you are either in the past, present, or future. Now it stands to reason that you would always be in the present, because that’s the only time and space that technically exists, right? But odds are, if you’re like most people, which I am sure you are, you travel between all three states of time each and every day.
Here’s an example:
The other night I was having a conversation and the person I was speaking with was stressed out about what he believes is going to happen in 4 months.
So in the spirit of playing devil’s advocate and painting a clear picture I said, “let me understand this, you are overwhelming yourself with something that has not happened yet and may not ever happen at all?”
He chuckled.
I went on, “as a thinking man, who loves numbers, and deals in the logic of science, does it make sense to stress yourself about a circumstance that may never exist?”
He laughed again.
I continued, “what do you not have enough of in this very moment? What need is not currently met?”
He said, “money.”
I said, “money for what?”
He said, “I don’t have enough money to go longer than 4 months.”
Then I reminded him that he has enough of EVERYTHING that he needs right now and he agreed. But he was so busy traveling through time (and predicting a future that may never come) that he could not see that he has more than enough right here in the present.
I am an expert time traveler myself, except I seem to spend most of my time hanging out in the past. I like to stress myself out over things that have already happened. Stuff that can’t be undone. I replay conversations over and over in my head. I think about all the things that the other person said and all the things that I should have said, but didn’t. I tear the scabs off old wounds. I allow thoughts to keep me awake at night and invade the sacred space of my dreams. It’s quite ridiculous actually, but it’s true. While I can’t stand the way it makes me feel, I get caught up traveling back in time on a pretty regular basis.
Here’s another example:
Has anyone ever asked you about being somewhere or saying something and you just couldn’t remember? The person is trying to jog your memory by recalling the setting, the smells, your facial expression, but you just don’t have a clue.
Could he/she be mistaking you for someone else? If you can’t remember you must not have been there. But they insist that you were, obviously their memory is much better than yours.
But what if you didn’t forget? Perhaps your body was there and you even engaged in conversation, but you weren’t there at all.
Maybe you were time traveling…. again.
Before now you may have thought that Facebook and texting were the biggest reasons that people have trouble with presenteeism, but people have been traveling through time way before Mark Zuckerberg learned how to multiply, and it won’t stop.
While sometimes it’s great to relive the past and ponder the future, there really is no time like the present. What I mean to say is there is NO time BUT the present.
All the good stuff happens in the here and now. (click to tweet)
Be here. Right now.
This post is part of the This is 40″blog series.