Does time pass?

1. Call to mind any thought directed toward some past event. Ask yourself: “When is this thought arising?” Settle into the self-evident answer: “It’s arising now–that is, in the present?”

2. Test: “When does any past-oriented thought arise?” Answer: “In the present.”

3. Go on from here to consider: “This thought seems to point to some past event. Does this thought ever reach out beyond itself to make contact with that past event? Can this thought ever extend beyond itself?” You might posit that some event occurred and somehow was recorded and then somehow is contained within or is somehow accessible to this thought. But this theory, or some other, is not really in question here since it’s only hearsay anyway. What is in question here is what can be discerned precisely in the direct experience of this arising thought. Again: “Can you find any evidence of some past event, or some representation of said past event, within and yet somehow separate from this thought itself?” Note what’s self-evident: In this thought, you only discover the thought. That is, we can find no evidence for the view that this thought is representational. All we actually ever discover is that this thought is “self-presentational.” In other words, this thought only presents–itself.

4. Consider again: “Of what does this thought consist?” Answer: “It consists only of thinking.” Let this understanding settle in before going on.

5. Then go one step further: “Looking more closely, can you see that ‘the stuff’ of which this thought is made is only Consciousness, or Aware Presence?” Look gently yet closely until it’s clear to you that the thought’s very stuff is only the stuff of Consciousness. Realize that there’s nothing to the thought except for Consciousness.

Let this understanding settle in.

6. The same line of inquiry into a future-oriented thoughts reveals:

• First, that the thought is only occurring in the present.
• Second, that the thought only presents itself; it does not ‘touch’ or ‘make contact with’ anything other than itself.
• Third, that this thought is, more deeply understood, actually made of Consciousness alone.

7. So, one “past-oriented” thought, arising in the present, is made of Consciousness while another “future-oriented” thought, arising in the present, is also made of Consciousness.

8. We find no evidence, then, for the independent existence of past events or for future events. We only find evidence for thoughts whose “internal dreamscapes” seem to refer to such events without being able to touch either. Yet since we find no actual evidence for a “thing” or an “event” concerning the past and the future, we can’t conclude that there is a present, either. Why not? What, really, is a present in the absence of a past or a future?

9. The present, in actuality, is nothing but Presence. Let this sink in.

10. In truth, then, nothing (no-thing) ever happens. Time doesn’t really pass. True, thoughts arise, but thoughts–like spontaneous poetry–are only the expressions of Consciousness. Abide, then, as Consciousness whenever any thought appears.

11. But where am I in ‘all of this’? I’m in Presence. Yet since I can only touch Presence, I am Presence.

12. And this Presence is Self-aware.

13. Relax the investigation here: I am Aware Presence; I am only Aware Presence.