“When God created time, he said nothing about hurry, African proverb says. However, regardless of that, the fact is that time escapes us. We suffer from a chronic lack of time. Our time is measured by a chronometer, or a clock, while in other cultures time was weighed, which was the task of Kairos, the god of the right moment.
Different sciences approach the concept of time differently: history emphasizes chronology and tries to separate different periods, psychology studies the subjective experience of time, in natural sciences since Newton there has been talk of absolute time, while with Einstein everything became relative. In this way or in similar ways, philosophers of all epochs have connected time with human consciousness. However, time still remains a mystery for us and something that we find difficult to control.
Time is a journey
Last year, during a train journey from Innsbruck to Graz, I had a close encounter with time. I understood time as a closed whole, just like the journey from Innsbruck to Graz.” The past was the path I had already traveled, the future was the path that lay ahead of me, and the present was the place where I currently found myself. The more I was in my time, meaning on my path, the more I felt it as peace, as a sense of being, like a train gliding smoothly and evenly forward. The further I moved away from my time, or rather from my path, the more it seemed that time was passing by faster. It was as if I stepped off the train and got lost among hills and ski resorts, or the path led me to bars and restaurants in pursuit of pleasures and the so-called life. The more I rushed, the more it seemed that time was flying by. However, it wasn’t time that was moving forward, it was me who was running away from my true path and goal.
In that moment, I realized that time is the path, and the path is the goal. Because, like in the story of Frau Holle, it is not enough to just walk the path if we want to reach the goal, we need to make use of time, to take the bread out of the oven and shake the tree, then we will be rewarded at the end of the journey. to the translation is an art, it is never enough to simply replace words or phrases with their synonyms or use a literal translation. The true essence and meaning of the original text can easily be lost if not carefully crafted into a new language. With that in mind, here is a translation attempt:
“Receiving a golden reward, or else, encountering misfortune.
Chronos – the devourer.
According to Greek mythology, Chronos dethroned his father Uranus. In order to avoid a similar fate, he swallowed all of his children. Only Zeus managed to save himself through cunning and defeat him. Chronos embodies everything that is old, as well as the mystery of time. Time devours all its children, everything gets lost in the darkness of time, except for Zeus who represents strength. Whoever gains power over themselves will gain power over time. It is important to detach what is essential, what is divine, from the “claws of time” and derive experience from it. The richness of Chronos is experience. Time heals all wounds and helps us extract true experience. Those who do not use time wisely, who do not learn and mature through time, will be devoured by time. Those who do not remove the cause of illness become chronically sick; those who do not remove the cause of dissatisfaction become chronically unsatisfied; those who do not continually renew themselves In the daily routine, one becomes chronically tired.
Truly solving problems means gaining power over oneself, over one’s fears, selfishness, aggression, vanity, carelessness, etc. Time “swallows” a passive and unconscious person. When problems are not solved, many of them become chronic. When we run away from life, we feel like time is running away from us. Stress and pressure continue to increase, while at the same time the fear of free time deepens, which we immediately spend so that we don’t have to face ourselves.
But for an active and conscious person, Kronos is like an old sage. Such a person transforms time into experience and a path that leads to oneself. Since they approach difficulties actively, they don’t feel pressure, but instead understand time as something necessary for everything they have taken on to grow and mature, as something that always offers them new opportunities.
Kairos – the right opportunity
It is precisely here that Kairos enters the stage. He is the youngest son of Zeus and K
Grandson of Kronos. He was considered the god of the right moment and the right opportunity. He was depicted as a young man with winged feet because, like a good opportunity, it quickly slips away. He is bald, or rather has only one strand of hair in front, because an opportunity must be seized like a handful. In one hand, he holds a scale with which he weighs time, and in the other, a sharp blade with which he cuts off useless ties that keep us trapped in the past and thus opens the door to the future. Kronos measures the amount of elapsed time, which represents past experiences, while Kairos denotes the present moment, a dimensionless point of the present. Kairos reveals a new dimension of time, which we usually do not perceive, and that is the quality of time, the right moment. A cat can chase a mouse for hours until it becomes exhausted, or it can calmly and attentively wait for an opportunity to catch the mouse with one paw movement.
In order to seize an opportunity, we need inner peace and attention, which we cannot have if we constantly rush back and forth. If we want to seize the right opportunity, we must We need to know exactly where we want to go. Life constantly offers us numerous opportunities, they are like countless trains passing by the stations. Kairos does not mean catching any train, but catching the train that will take us home. Kairos helps us to act correctly at the right moment. It means taking the bread out of the oven and shaking the apples off the tree when the time is right.
Accordingly, we can never lose time, only opportunities. Those who catch Kairos, who seize the right opportunity, turn time into a journey, and a journey into a goal. In that sense, we can easily understand the words of Victor Hugo: “The future has many names – for the weak it is called the Unattainable, for the fearful it is the Unknown, and for the brave it is the Opportunity.”
Time – our friend or enemy
Kronos and Kairos reveal two aspects of time to us – quantity and quality; the long past with its experiences and the current present with its opportunities. It depends on us whether time becomes our friend or enemy. The more scattered we are and We are rushing from one obligation to another more and more, time is passing faster and we are not delving into the depths where we could discover a treasure trove of experiences. And we miss out on even more opportunities because we lack the necessary peace and focus. The more focused we are, the more intense and profound our moments are, and in addition, we are more attentive to the potential real opportunity that we can seize by the hair. The more indecisive we are, the more time we lose because opportunities slip away, and the more determined and willing to take risks we are, the more time we gain. If everything ends well, it means that we have seized the opportunity, otherwise, at least we have gained experience. The more we measure time by its quantity, the more we lose the quality of the present moment. We would like to have more and more time, but we don’t actually know how to use it well. The more we discover the quality of time, the more we appreciate every minute. Half an hour of meaningful conversation is more valuable than five hours of watching television together. We long for our friends to become both our life and the path that is destined for us. If we merge with our path, time becomes eternity – then we are like a passenger on a train traveling peacefully, and the gusts of wind are like a sculptor carving our inner being from rough stone.
Frau Holle is a story by the Brothers Grimm. In the story, a hard-working stepdaughter jumps into a well to retrieve a lost spindle and wakes up in another world. She travels and helps those in need along the way (pulls bread out of the oven, shakes a tree that can no longer bear its ripe apples, assists Frau Holle with household chores). When she wants to go home, Frau Holle leads her through doors that sprinkle golden dust on her. When she returns home covered in gold, her stepsister sees this and desires the same gift. She descends into the well but is unwilling to help anyone. In return, she gets drenched in tar that she cannot wash off for the rest of her life..