Wasting God's Time

January 30, 1997

The notion behind putting this recording machine on now was to talk about a subject that came to mind earlier in the day. I thought that with a bit of luck and whatever else it might take we could get a paper out, the heading of which would be, WASTING GOD'S TIME.

 
In the background there is a Lou Reed CD playing. I've listened to it a number of times, barely followed the words - but when I do follow the words what becomes clear is that he is reporting honestly. He is also a good musician, so the combination results in something quite a pleasure to listen to. Good energy. I am yet to hear him say anything terribly remarkable, but that just goes to prove the point relative to a few lines of a poem that I wrote sometime back, called,
A NIGHT OUT:       
 
‘.... And it doesn't have to be profound
Truthfulness is always sound
It warms our soul, it gives us food 
An honest man an honest mood. ‘
 
These opening words are just an attempt to warm up the system and see whether the inspiration that came earlier in the day with this rather remarkable heading, Wasting God’s Time, might flow and serve as some kind of shock and reminder to those who are truly sensitive to The Issue Of Existence. 
 
Our usual, ‘normal’ thinking has been totally conditioned and formed by a mixture of words, notions, speculations and as if logic of our general society. That includes contemporary ‘wisdom’ as well as ‘facts’ from recent times to the ancient past; from stories of violence to stories of prophecy. All this comes together mechanically in each individual and ends off forming the corrupted framework that they do their thinking from - and ‘value’ this, that or the next thing.
 
There is a tremendous difference between that kind of thinking and the type of thinking which could occur if one were in a meditative, quiet, sensitive, emotionally and physically aware relationship to the moment. There the mystery and magnificence of life and existence is so overwhelmingly obvious that new questions tend to arise relative to AMAZING REALITY. 
 
Such as: 
 
WHERE are we? 
Where did we COME FROM?
HOW LONG are we here for? 
 
Is there ANYTHING 
worthwhile, valuable, lasting 
that we can accomplish or contribute to 
in the short time that we are alive?
 
From a certain place within an individual these last questions really do seem quite reasonable. Our habitual thinking however is predetermined by our narrow perceptions and those of the people around us as to what the situation is socially, what the possibilities are, what the limitations are, and what represents virtuous or evil activity. From that level these questions tend to appear ridiculous, romantic, even childish.
 
There are however certain facts that cannot be denied at either level.  Firstly, the fact that each individual was born, and will have only a limited time here on earth!
 
We don't know how long we’ll have, but a reasonably healthy person in a relatively secure geographic area is likely to be here somewhere between 75 and 95 years. Taking an average of 85 years it is not so difficult to calculate more specifically: 
 
How many MONTHS have we -  multiply  by 12, 
  “       “        WEEKS      “      “     -        “     by 4, 
  “       “        DAYS        “      “     -        “      by 7, 
  “       “        HOURS    “      “    -        “       by 24, 
  “       “     MINUTES    “      “    -        “       by 60.
 
We could multiply just once more by 60 and see how many seconds we might have.
The point is, each second ticking off on the clock is one less second that you’re going to be alive on earth!
 
WHAT IS ONE MEANT TO DO IN THIS LIMITED TIME ?
 
* * *
 
Of the very few of us who give time and consideration to issues of 
this nature, most refer back for their thinking material to what is 
called ‘traditional sources’ - the most common of which is religion.
 
Religions speak in the vernacular of a language that was current at the time and place of its revelation - but the cultural, semantic implications of words change in time. A notable consequence of this reality is that ‘religious language’ tends to induce an alternate mental framework. We can’t really think effectively about God or Meaning with our current idiomatic use of language, from the usual ‘social head’ that each one habitually reasons with. That mind is so constructed that it can deal with every issue in the world, other than:   
WHY ARE WE HERE - AND WHAT CAN BE DONE ABOUT IT ?
 
That is what religions are concerned with! But they speak in terms that, perchance, could have been understood at the time they were recorded. They still do have the power to affect us emotionally and to place us, sometimes, or at least some people, within a state where these ultimate questions make sense, at least as questions. Those emotions are so unlike our usual sense of life that they tend to be accepted, if at all, as THE religious experience - and as if the maximum of what could be known or experienced in that area. 
 
When we examine what is said within various religious texts it becomes clear that at the point they ‘came to life’ they were not widely accepted or understood. We have some examples, however symbolic or real in historic terms. The story of Moses receiving the Law on Mount Sinai - which is the basis of the Jewish religion - and the revolt of the masses around him at the time. Then, in the Christian religion - not only did the masses not ‘catch the point’ but even the disciples were accused of reading the issue in ‘simple life terms’ and not fully understanding that which they were promoting. In the Koran, there is more than one reference to the mentality of people who would read the text, and inevitably say, ‘Oh we've heard all that before, old wives’ tales, superstition!’ 
 
So that which was rejected in its origin and purity, we find thousands of years later adopted in a most questionable fashion by masses of people with distorted, life infected, pride infected minds - and even ready to go out and kill in the name of their holy text!
 
Now it seems impossible for most people to address Reality with a simple, clear and relevant question - or for them to hear anything true through their severely conditioned minds.
 
Here we try to make a tape titled ‘Wasting God’s Time’ and I ask myself what the chances are of saying anything clear, worthwhile, useful, to those who feel a need for clarity on these issues, but find themselves confused within notions of thousands of years ago. To those caught in a verbal, linguistic, semantic constipation - all of which is a BURNING SORE ON THEIR HEART AND CONSCIENCE. To those who would like nothing better than to Work clearly and seriously in the interest of the ‘good’ that they feel is the Essence of the Universe - and is consistent with their inner sense that there is meaning to our existence, and that there really is: SOMETHING to DO!
 
Or, as the Koran says: 
 
‘WHAT DO YOU THINK  
THAT WE CREATED YOU 
FOR SPORT?’
 
* * *
 
When talking as I'm now doing there is some kind of assumption of just who is being addressed. When a person talks to anyone they attempt to talk to their ‘understanding’.They have to estimate, more or less, what the other person could understand, could receive. Otherwise the whole exercise would be useless. If a policeman stops a motorist, he assumes the individual knows certain things - the speed limit, the necessity for certain documentation, the necessity to speak to an  ‘officer of the law’ with respect. He assumes all these things when he approaches the driver. If he doesn't get it, he infers that either the motorist shouldn't be a motorist, or he shouldn't be a policeman.
 
So, here I'm talking into a tape about issues that, if they have any relevance, obviously covers everybody. Everyone was born, everyone has a limited time, and: 
 
EVERYBODY WONDERS - WHAT TO DO ? 
 
On the other hand, how many different ways people listen! How is it possible to get through with this common question that everyone has, however aware they are of it or not? How to pass through their  subjective, conditioned, ‘clever’ mind so they might grasp that someone was addressing an issue that really was of deep concern to them - even if that fact may not be totally obvious to begin with. How to show that the person talking was not trying to sell the listener a ‘bill of goods’, some imagined story that if accepted would be to his, the speaker's, advantage - but in fact was an attempt to connect with something of vital interest to the listener, if he could only listen and if the speaker had the ability and good luck to be able to convey it clearly.
 
* * *
 
Why is it so obvious to certain people and not to others that we
are created beings? 
 
We are CREATED Beings !
 
It’s so obvious - we did not make ourselves! We don't know where we came from, and we don't know really what keeps us alive moment to moment. What we do know is that we didn't go into a factory and make ourselves - our incredible eyes, ears, digestive system, our minds, our emotions, our ability to breathe in the air and stand up straight, fall asleep at night and wake up in the morning, our love and our learning capacity. We haven't constructed those faculties ourselves. We are obviously created beings!
 
It seems that some so-called ‘Darwinists’ may still imagine that life developed mechanically through the process of ‘survival of the fittest’ and that somehow some germ turned into a you and a me. I think that anyone with relatively clear perception and emotional maturity finds that kind of assumption totally ridiculous. A Sufi reflection on that issue went something like this: ‘If you were to dump a truckload of bricks on the ground, you would hardly expect a house to pop up!’ 
 
We are quite an organized package - the farthest thing one can imagine from an accident. We have been created by something HIGHER. Whatever questions might arise from that reality there is one unmistakable fact: we are here in the body for a LIMITED TIME, whatever the why or the how or the what of it all really is.
 
And again, I return to the inspirational title of this discussion, namely:
 
WASTING GOD'S TIME 
 
And Lou Reed continues to vocalize in the background.
 
I’ll try to touch the issue from another angle. The only way we can stop Wasting God’s Time is:
 
TO BE 
IN TIME with GOD !  
 
What would it mean to be ‘In Time with God’? Well, if we were to step out of our usual circumstances and place ourselves alone, smack within nature, be it a forest or a mountain top or in the desert, that would allow us to feel what we already know - that nature is a distinctively synchronized, integrated system. Everything in its place and on time! The changing of the seasons, the earth circling the sun, the moon circling the earth, the very exact range of temperatures that allow human and other forms of life to exist. Everything so exact and synchronized. The cycle of impregnation, birth and growth of human beings - baby comes out, mother's milk is ready. Nature flows on beautifully and perfectly - everything so to speak in God's Time! 
 
Everything that synchronizes in God's time functions relative to its own essence! Uniquely, within man's essence is a ‘hidden’, latent potential, to evolve - and far farther than he might imagine - should he be rightly connected!
 
* * *
 
Now, repeating more or less what has just been said at the end of the first side of this tape: 
 
Man can realize his full growth potential, the potential that he was endowed with at birth, if he is in synchronization with the perfection of the creation - that is, ‘In Time With God’. 
 
GOD’S TIME AND MAN’S TIME 
ARE NOT MEASURED WITH 
THE SAME CLOCK. 
 
A man has the capacity to hear the Sound of God’s clock. If he can attune himself to the ‘sound of God’s clock’ - he can stop wasting God’s time!
 
The sound of God’s clock has been heard by some men from the beginning of time. Traditions that have emerged from those sources that heard the sound of God’s clock called it the NAME, THE NAME OF GOD or THE WORD OF GOD ! 
 
‘The Name Of God’ or ‘The Word Of God’ are but linguistic means of identifying the Sound of God’s clock. 
 
At the most essential level, a word or a name - is a sound (vibration). There is a sound that can be ‘heard’, subsequent to a refinement of energies, transformed through sincere, good-willed activities based on True Knowledge. 
 
 
A person sufficiently clean and humble, present and aware 
can actually come to a place where he can hear 
the Word, the Name, the Sound 
of what could be called ‘God’s Tempo’ 
synchronized in God’s Time 
and connected to all other 
synchronized elements, 
and as a result be receptive to 
Higher Intelligence 
which is a part of that total system, 
and consequently develop the 
insight, understanding and capacity to 
function, receive, transmit and work 
within and on behalf of that 
TOTAL UNIVERSAL REALITY 
that we call 
GOD 
 
And 
STOP WASTING GOD'S TIME !
 
The state or condition of sensitivity that an individual must be in in order to hear the sound of God’s clock is what has been called in the English language CONSCIENCE. The equivalent in Hebrew is that lovely sounding word, namely MATZPUN. 
 
Rightly and accurately has ‘CONSCIENCE’ been identified as:
 
GOD’S REPRESENTATIVE 
ON EARTH !
 
The ‘ring’ of CONSCIENCE, harmonizes/synchronises, and as a result CO-OPERATES, in/with GOD’S TIME and the overall intention of the creation.
The logic of all of that in practical functioning terms is not man's ‘normal logic’. Thus it is said: 
 
MAN’S REASON and GOD’S REASON 
ARE NOT 
THE SAME
 
One of the historical results of this reality is that a truth-ful person ends up, or can end up, ‘nailed to a cross’. That story being the truth, in symbolic form, of the inevitable contradictions between the ‘logic’ of the Universe and man’s distorted sense of reality that he, in an egoistic mode, is quite prepared to kill for.
Health of mind, body and soul is dependent on the synchronization of man’s vibration with the Word, the Name, the Sound of God’s clock - The Intelligent Universe! Uniquely enough man’s connection with this reality brings forth a latent intelligence that can understand in functional terms: 
 
THE DIRECTION AND PURPOSE OF EXISTENCE 
that being an 
Evolutionary Process 
towards the growth of 
Consciousness.
 
‘I was a secret treasure, and wished to be known’ (Hadith)
 
* * *
 
In the age we are now living, people again tend to describe
‘Spiritual Progress’, as a growth of Consciousness. 
 
‘EXPANDED CONSCIOUSNESS’ 
they call it.
 
‘All roads lead to Rome’ - but they pass through very different territory. Very complex and rough territory, corrupted and difficult territory, unique and subjective territory. Thus the challenge for an individual to find a True Path for himself that will lead to Rome, or Home, or Truth, or Peace, or Love, depending upon the individual’s inclination towards ‘labeling’. Religions call it a ‘Return’ (chozer). A return to Truth, to God - to Now! 
 
THIS IS THE 
UNIQUE CAPACITY 
OF A HUMAN BEING 
ON EARTH 
 
Any and all activities that are undertaken without that aim in mind are, without a doubt, WASTING GOD’S TIME. The justifications are a shame - a Universal and Cosmic shame - immensely sad, and so pathetically understandable.
 
KNOWLEDGE of how to overcome the distortions and obstacles has always been available. That Knowledge comes through from the Place of Clarity - the next evolutionary level up from man’s ‘normal’ functioning. Knowledge from that Source is an absolute requirement for one to overcome the obstacles on the Way.
 
Those who reject God/Higher Intelligence, inevitably reject Knowledge, and as a result seal their fate at the level they find themselves - and suffer the consequences. 
 
 
And, last but not least: 
 
WASTE GOD’S TIME !
 
Which brings to mind a short poem:
 
“You’d be surprised to know that 
God isn’t sentimental 
at all 
No shit!”
 
Such poems are meant to stimulate an emotional flow of energy in the direction required for some sensitivity to this most REAL and ULTIMATE issue. 
 
 
END