saidsimply

You do not own your time. But time is a gift from God. Further, deadlines are not just urgent because of bad consequences, but are urgent because they represent the dividing line between discipline or despondency.

‘Potential’ changes to ‘actuality’ as the future becomes the present, and then the present becomes the stable and immovable past, like cement solidifying into rock-hard concrete. This direction of reality through time means that time is a fundamentally scarce resource, and therefore requires frugality, diligence, and discipline in order manage it well. But common ‘wisdom’ says instead that time yours to keep, or that it’s ‘automatic’ or ‘predetermined’ as materialists say reducing effort from will to mechanism. This mindset is a self-fulfilling prophecy, producing the very reality it proports to assert: that we are controlled robots. No, we are free to choose, and time is the medium of choice given to us by Christ, who would have us use it to serve Him or our neighbors.

The way to manage time with care, is praying, not planning. As we practice orienting our plans toward God’s will instead of our own, we accept testing instead entitlement, learning to take joy in suffering, responsibility, and accountability, and further, treating pleasures as a spiritual plague that lulls our hearts into a false sense of security.

The highs and lows of our emotions start to look more like an abundance of self directed attention and an over-emphasis on our own experiences through life instead of attending to service and sacrifice to others and to God. Though often we must return again and again to repentance when our sins, habits, or demons get the better of us.