I’m on my way to the station. From a distance I see an advertising poster at the side of the road. It shows a holiday scene. A man is walking towards the water on the seashore with a surfboard under his arm. As I approach, I read: “Let go of time”. Did I read it right? Something irritates me … Shouldn’t it rather read: “Time to let go” or “Time to let something go”? Letting go of time “in itself”, being free of time – how should that work?
On holiday I can temporarily feel freer than in everyday life. I have fewer obligations and can decide more spontaneously to do something specific. But hotels and restaurants, museums and cultural events all have their time frames that I have to stick to.
On my way to work, the last holiday comes to mind. What had that been like with the freedom of time for me? In fact, I was counting the days: “Oh how wonderful, eight days of holiday!” … “Now only three more days, they want to be well used!” Then it was over, the beautiful holiday time. Time could not be held on to or extended. At no point was I free of it.
Many people expect an adventure for their holiday, or at least a change from routine and everyday life. Or they look for a thrill in their free time, such as mountain climbing, bungee or extreme sports. Others reach for an addictive substance or get high at a mass event where many emotions are aroused and they feel more alive as a result. Those who go on holiday or embark on an adventure are ready to let go and open themselves to new things, making their hearts wide and free. They become more aware of the moment in the here-and-now.
But does life begin on holiday, at an event, a special occasion? When the event, the stimulus is over, we are the same people as before with our conditioning and habits. Can we in this situation be truly free and new in the moment? To be in the here-and-now, what is that anyway? Is it the freedom of time? We are strongly conditioned and thus our today is the result of what has happened in the past and of what, as a result of that, is expected of us in the future, because nothing remains without effect. The law of karma always restores the necessary balance in the long run. Is there anything beyond that that has an effect on the now, the present moment?
Something that allows us to experience life as a flow that is always new and fresh? That lifts us above our past? Our bonds are strong, our imprints, our ego-consciousness, our ego-identity. With this identity we are always in the past, so to speak, we come from it. Or is there, despite of all this, something that goes beyond it?
In an article on LOGON Online entitled Two kinds of time for two worlds
Tonal was the “real time” of daily life, the time that is also given to us by calendars and clocks, which creates structures and enables order in our society.
Nagual exists alongside it. It means something else than the well-known phenomenon that there is an inner, subjective experience of time that can last longer or shorter depending on the circumstances and deviates from the external passage of time.
Nagual has an other-worldly dimension.
“How does the path from Tonal lead to the inner Nagual, to the supramundane Nagual? The first step is continual exploration and absolute honesty about what you encounter within yourself, both in terms of obstacles and spiritual potential. This is an investigation through our ‘observer’, the objective non-judgemental looking with the soul. (…) Through this observer we can look at ourselves with a certain distance.”
Nagual is called the reservoir of intuition, the door to a higher consciousness. So we are a composite being belonging to different levels of existence. When the level of Nagual awakens in us, silence spreads in the mind and heart. They are the prerequisite for impulses from the supernatural dimension to work in and through us.
Thus we live simultaneously in two dimensions of time. If our consciousness is permeated by Nagual, we immediately take in the supernatural, spiritual dimension in the here-and-now, free from our conditions. Meanwhile, we move simultaneously in the tonal, the outer space-time, because the realisation of what we take up in our consciousness must first develop in it to become an experience.
The seeing of the soul in the nagual stillness is dynamic, it is connected with insights and impulses through which we can develop soulfully. There is the pure, deep soul world. It is a developmental goal that can shine in the midst of the tangled paths of our lives. Our daily life takes on a new meaning, it has acquired a reference to eternity. All experiences on the outside ultimately serve inner growth. The awakening in Nagual leads to the fact that I can put everything that happens to me externally into the service of inner development. In the truest sense of the word, I can “make the most” of it. For everything can serve inner maturation and becoming open to the life that knows no death, with which we are all at one in depth and which needs each of us. The indigenous peoples possessed this knowledge. We can regain it.
