Where Are We Running To?

Leonardo Boff

14/02/2008

Opinión

^-A ⁺A

A primary characteristic of the present is the acceleration of time. We have conquered practically all terrestrial space, but time continues to be the great challenge. Can we conquer it?

The race against time exists in all spheres, starting with sports. Every Olympic competition looks to break all previous records, especially in the classic 100 meter dash. Race cars must forever be faster, planes and airships have to surpass the speed of the previous generation. Chemical growth fertilizers are used in agribusiness to shorten growing times and increase profit. The internet works at very high speeds, and without cables, because, to save time, everything is done via satellite. Acceleration has especially reached the stock exchange. The faster capital can be moved from one market to another, taking into account the time zone, the greater the profits. More than ever, "time is money."

There certainly is a liberating element in all this, since time has largely been experienced as our enslaver. We cannot hold it back. On the other hand, it impacts nature, that has its seasons and its cycles. The impact on people's minds is also not negligible. They feel confused, particularly the aged, who lose the parameters of orientation and the ability to analyze what is going on in the world and within themselves.

Is this dash which cannot be stopped, worth it? Where are we running to?

And woe unto those who do not adapt to the times! In the workplace, they are expelled because their skills become obsolete. Those who do not update themselves lose the rhythm of the times, and are considered prematurely aged, or more simply, backwards. That can also happen to whole countries, if they do not incorporate the advances of scientific technology. They all must modernize rapidly and become emerging countries.

Where will this race against time take us? Time always wins, because we cannot freeze it. Simply, time passes slowly or rapidly, as in the great particle acceleration tunnels.

But it is important to consider that there is time, and there are tempos. The natural time of growth of a giant tree can take 50 years. The technological time to cut it down with a chainsaw is only 5 minutes. How long does it take us to grow into maturity, wisdom, and to conquer our own heart? Sometimes a whole lifetime of 80 years is much too short... Internal time does not obey clock time. We need time to work out our internal conflicts; sometimes those conflicts even force us to slow down.

A reflection from Zen master Chuang-Tzu, 2,500 years ago, is very inspiring. The Zen master tells of a person who always was perturbed on contemplating his own shadow, and was so enraged by his footprints that he thought the best thing would be to get rid of both of them. He tried the escape, first from one, and then from the other. He stood up and began to run, but every time he put a foot on the ground a footprint would appear, and his shadow followed him easily.

He thought his mistake was that he was not running properly. So he began to run faster and without stopping... until he fell down, dead. His mistake, the master commented, was not having noticed that by walking into a dark place, his shadow would have disappeared, and that if he would have remained still, there would have been no footprints following him...

Is that not what must be done now? Shouldn't we slow down? Therein lies the secret of happiness and of the desired interior peace.

(Free translation from the Spanish provided by Melina Alfaro. Done at Refugio del Rio Grande, Texas).

https://www.alainet.org/en/articulo/127749