The tyranny of time: let's cast it off.

Now is the time for all good men (and women) to throw off the tyranny of time - if we can manage it. I know too many enslaved people. They (we) live time-starved lives, daily fighting their way through ever more crowded schedules. Deadline follows deadline, demand piles upon demand. No time for this, no time for that. Like Puritan ascetics of old, these harassed persons constantly lash themselves if they waste a precious hour. They pay for leisure with anxious bouts of self-reproach and nonmoral pangs of guilt.

These are highly socialized and moral folks for the most part, so they are not striving for wealth, power, or vapid celebrity status. Nor do they suffer from gluttony, lust, despair, envy, or anger. (Well, maybe a touch of envy for those who work more efficiently and get more good deeds done.) Temptation comes for certain Americans who love their work in the guise of invitations to outings "just for fun." Oh, how sinful to sit in the sun accomplishing nothing. Self-driven types can often "take five," or engage in a pause that refreshes, but then it's back to the grindstone, or laptop. Time, relentless time, waits for no man.

Yes Emily, I hear you. "Because I could not stop for Death. He kindly stopped for me - " and so on. But we're not talking death here - at least not yet. The problem is how to make the best use of every single moment before our hour has come. And if we are Christians it can be worse, because part of the Last Judgment is being called to account for how we spend our lives. So much good work to be done; so many loved ones to nurture; so many needs to be met. This isn't a case of some '60s siren singing, "So many men, so little time." Nobody in this particular crowd is laying waste their powers. It's more of a conflict of good with good.

So how, short of dying or contracting chronic fatigue syndrome, can the time-obsessed be liberated? One hopeful strategy is to reappraise the reigning Western theory of time that dominates our everyday thinking. In our Newtonian picture of the universe time is linear, abstract, absolute - a continuous number-line or container of events out there somewhere beyond events. Time relentlessly ticks away, no matter what. In the more sophisticated picture of the arrow of time given by Stephen Hawking, we still see a relentless, one-way progression of the universe from a big bang toward some goal, maybe even a final collapse upon itself. Odd anomalies like black holes may mess up the picture, but in the generally accepted scientific vision of the universe we still must cope with a one-way directional flow of time that is largely indifferent to human needs.

Are there no appealing alternatives? Ancient theories of the world and time as illusory or caught in endless repetitive and futile cycles aren't much help. A more inviting prospect lies in anthropological accounts of the Trobriand Islanders for whom time was like a "puddle in which one sat, splashed, or wallowed," that is, discontinuous and organized in qualitative wholes. But I can't really give up a Newtonian paradigm of time on the testimony of a South Sea culture. Isn't there some way to keep the scientific evidence for time's arrow progressing in one direction toward a goal and yet get a little breathing room?

Yes, according to a wonderful book by theoretical psychologist Brent D. Slife, Time and Psychological Explanation (SUNY Press, 1993). Slife offers alternative scientific and philosophical theories of time and causation. (And he doesn't even resort to Saint Augustine's erudite struggles to understand time.) The overall point Slife makes is that new types of systems-thinking cast doubt on Newton's abstract, deterministic time-line in the sky.

Slife asserts that we can keep the general forward progression of time inherent in science's big bang theory but recognize that other rhythms of nature and holistic change will be relative and not rigid or reductionistic. The logic of before and after always applies but different causes can produce instantaneous changes that are not quantitative but qualitative. Time occurs through the interrelationships of events, not outside of them. In the end, Slife thinks, we can rationally argue for the intriguing assertion that, in a universe containing many different natural processes and different kinds of causes, "time hops and skips and flits."

All right, now we can break out of the Newtonian straitjacket of relentless, oppressive theories of time ticking away beyond control. But can I make something morally and religiously of these liberating ideas? Well, certainly a renewed emphasis upon qualitative time-change can bring me back to the familiar spiritual truth that engaging in prayer places you in "the eternal present" of God. Or as Augustine says, One who is "ever present, never future, never past." But to engage in "the sacrament of the present moment" you have to take time to pray and worship. Is this the only way to break free from obsessions with time?

Lately I've also begun to glimpse another insight about time and life. Why, pray tell, do I think that my time is my own private possession? After all, my existence in time and my beloved stream of consciousness is a gift of a gracious God. Isn't the essence of love and obedience to recognize that my self-appropriated, possessively guarded time belongs to the Creator of Time? My basic job is to joyfully receive the time bestowed.

If I can just be receptive enough and let go, maybe I can let up. Surely if all is gift then it's a fine thing to bask in the sun and delight in the moon's beauty. Then onward to the opera, the ballet, the galleries, the lectures, and lingering with friends in cafes over coffee. A new life as an appreciative receiver of gifts opens before me.

Mmm. Either I'm about to make a leap into a new level of spiritual wisdom or I'm coming down with some subtle form of multiple personality disorder. I've always thought that if I had to have other identities I'd like one to be that of a lady who lunches. But at this point only one dissociated part of me could give up the struggle to get more things done.

How I resonate to Augustine's prayer after he has tried to understand time; he prays to the Lord who is "eternally at work and eternally at rest." Perhaps this is the Peace we long for.