It’s 8:07 A.M., traffic is horrendous, I overslept by ½ hour, and I’m already seven minutes late for an appointment that I’ve been waiting to have for three weeks now! I’m not only always on time, I’m always early! However, as I make my way into the crowded office building, the C.E.O. of the largest, most successful television network bumps into me. He quickly apologizes and compliments me on my briefcase. We end up briefly chatting and sharing an elevator together, but inevitably are going to different floors. He hands me his crisp, weighted business card and tells me to call if there’s anything he can do to assist me.
Wow! What an amazing chance encounter, which most certainly wouldn’t have happened had I been the usual 20 minutes early for my business appointment. Whether we’re early, late, or are fortunate enough to be punctual, every aspect of our highly developed existence is dependent on some form of time.
So, I got to thinking about not only time, but timing. Doesn’t timing inevitably have everything and nothing to with life? I mean, if it weren’t for timing, would any of us really be exactly who we are today? Would we have experienced all of the many gifts and challenges that life has dealt us?
Life is filled with a variety of both understandable and inexplicable circumstances. The people that come into and leave our lives at certain times and the unusual life altering situations that each and every one of us experiences play a role in the shaping of the kind of person that we are. Nevertheless, all of this is somehow associated with timing.
I can recall a very good friend, telling me when I was in college, that her mother used to tell her that “People come into your life for a reason, a season, or a lifetime,” and I must say, I’ve always liked that saying and thought it to be profoundly beautiful and accurate. When you really think about it, everyone isn’t meant to be in your life forever. If you reminisce about childhood friends, high school sweethearts, college heartthrobs, and the mesmerizing number of people that come into our lives, very rarely do people stay longer for the play than Acts I or II.
Perhaps, it really is true. Maybe, the paths of the people we cross are meant to teach us something, hence the “reason” they’re in our life, to aid in the discovery of an important lesson, a skill, an emotion, or a message. As a potential consequence, an even smaller number of people are supposed to spend “a season” with us. Who’s to say how long the season will be, it could me months, years, even decades. Then, there’s those extremely rare individuals who are supposed to spend “a lifetime together,” usually close siblings, our children, or devoted friends with which we are to experience youth, life, and age with. This saying is very much so encapsulated with the very essence of time and timing being at its core.
Even if you think about the future, like where you want to be in five years, what you want to have accomplished, what you want your life to look like (whether it be from the perspective of your career or family, such as married with children), isn’t some of it contingent upon timing? I mean, even if you’re working rigorously towards something, it doesn’t always mean that you’re going to see the results that you want, when you want, right? But, that doesn’t mean you don’t stop working towards whatever your dream, passion, or goal is. It just means that it’s not quite time, yet.
It’s very intriguing to me, because people are always saying things like “You have to take it one day at a time,” but what exactly does that mean? Okay, okay, okay. So, of course, it means the obvious, you can’t rush into things too fast; you have to allow things to take its natural course. I also think this saying suggests people to slow down a little bit, and attempt to live in the moment as opposed to living in the future.
As I make my way into attempting to understand the magnitude and relevance of time and timing, I can’t help but think that simultaneously they are both so connected and so far apart. When the question of time is brought to the forefront, it has a most tangible, concrete undertone present. For example, what time is it? It is 12:30 P.M., and the company picnic was rained out.
However, when the question of timing is evaluated, it tends to have a more abstract, conceptual ring to it. The timing for his promotion was all wrong due to the extreme departmental budget cuts. The very nature of timing tends to have the ability to invoke greater emotional, intellectual, and spiritual discussion.
Even after all of this investigative dialogue, I have one question to pose to you…How and what does time and timing have to do with our lives?
Now on to the music selections for this article,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJ5LmQmQZqg (The Song: Time after Time; The Artist: Cyndi Lauper. This song has been remade so many times over, that it’s amazing. Definitely a classic song about time.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKXEbSpmpDw (The Song: Til the End of Time; The Artist: Justin Timberlake. This song links time and love together. A very nice soothing feel to this song. Enjoy!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpmILPAcRQo (The Song: Time of my Life; Theme Song from Dirty Dancing. Another classic song that addresses both time and timing!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrNoDUblAtE (The Song: Better in Time; The Artist: Leona Lewis. A great song about how things actually get better in time, and inevitably timing has everything to do with this!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDxsM5jLNxM (The Song: Remember the Time; The Artist: Michael Jackson. This music collection wouldn’t be complete with one from the King of Pop!)
