On the Currency of Time, and Trust, and Terms

I wrote in a comment not long ago about Time being its own currency. It was one of those insights that just popped up in the moment, that took me several days of pondering to really appreciate. So here, I want to think it out a bit more, in writing.

And by Time being its own currency, I mean that it's not one easily traded out, exchanged for something else. That we pay by Time - to make progress and undergo changes and earn things - and there's not much way to cheat it. If you think about it, we live in (at least) four dimensions, the first three being the three dimensions of space and the fourth being Time. We experience reality as a streaming through Time.

Some of us try to exchange Time, for thinking. (Guilty, as charged, yours truly, here...) We mistakenly believe that we can think our way to a place or position faster, and shorten Time. Or perhaps buy our way faster, by good works or volume.

And sometimes - get this one - sometimes, we just plain go into denial, believing we've made the growth we want to have made, when we really haven't, because we haven't put in the Time, yet. We are a manipulative, snivelling, conniving species, aren't we? We try to exert control over Time, rather than Accept it for what it is, and pay our dues.

In my own experience, I have recently lost profound trust for a person who was once extremely close to me. They are no longer close to me because of this very reason - that they egregiously breached the most basal trust, a boundary that is absolutely non-negotiable to me. And in the process, there was profound damage to very vulnerable parts of me, that are taking -- what?? -- Time, to heal. Time, to grieve. Time, to change. Time, to figure out what I own of that situation, and what to do about it, in myself. Time, to do the work, on myself.

It's not that I'm a hateful and begrudging sort. It's that I have Executive Rules of being, and one is that if you are systematically dishonest with me in a big way, I have no choice but to excise you. No choice, and no negotiation, if you breach The Barrier. I don't say this with feelings of hatred, or revenge. It just is. I can't expect to keep myself well if I'm entwined with a diseased, infectious sort.

When I look at trust, I find two components.

One is elemental, and that is: the item in question lines up with the expectation that the proposing party presents.

One is temporal, and I call that Track Record.

For me, Trust is not only the result of elemental integrity per se, it is also the result of a pattern of elemental integrity over Time.

And, Trust is dimensional. By that, I mean it has depth. The amount, the depth, of Trust I allot to you is a function of the quality of elemental integrity and the Track Record you have built with me (or, conversely, I have built with you).

So: integrity, consistency, longevity.

Trust is a lot like sobriety. Maybe they are essentially the same thing, really - one is an intangible form and the other a tangible form of the same principle. (I know, I talk a lot about tangible and intangible, because this is a concept I think God uses - leverages, cleverly - for a lot of irony, and this is one thing I'm fascinated with lately...)

Both Trust and sobriety require Time to build a solid base. And one fall can erode all the progress, back to square one, in a moment. They're both rather binary - black or white. On the wagon, or off. Then the building, and clock, start over again, until the Track Record is built-up, again over Time.

Let's use a stone building for analogy: One can only wreck and bomb it so many times, before it simply cannot be rebuilt structurally sound, again. And even one devastation, if the wreckage is fragmented enough, can render rebuilding virtually impossible. Well, for us. Thank goodness this is a program with a Higher Power, whose influence can surpass our abilities.

I'm at a year out now, from this particular Trust wreckage. It yielded circumstances that sent me back into an unmanageable life, and back to Step 1. As I reflect, with frustration, I can't feel the progress of the year most of the time. The pain doesn't seem to have subsided much. The progress seems so slow. I want to focus on misery rather than gratitude.

But I have become aware, now, that part of the roadblock for me is my failure to Accept Time. My continued illusion that I should control it, with skill. My stubborn insistence to define it, in a timeline, with expectations.

Because I'm not where I think I should be, one year out from this trauma and series of events. I want more progress, and less price.

But, at least I see it, now. And for that, I'm grateful. Now, I can re-define Time, as a goal. To Accept it.

God's timeline, not mine. I'm coming to Terms, with that, finally.

-The Traveler