Time Depends On Us

There is no time. A change in states gives us the sensation of time. I would not feel time if the state were not changing. Time is the number of changes that we notice.

Time can drag on, or it can fly—it all depends on a person’s inner sensation of the changes happening inside him. As soon as there are no changes, time disappears.

There is a mechanism unraveling inside of us that constantly awakens new qualities within. In them, I feel as if the world around me is changing. But really the world does not change—I am the one who changes. Stars explode, people run around, life happens all around me, but these are all qualities changing inside of me according to which I perceive reality.

People believed that time does not depend on us. But then Einstein came and stated that time is relative. If I move at a speed that approaches the speed of light, then time can speed up or slow down. It can even stop because time is not fixed from above; it depends on the observer.

Kabbalah says that time is the number of actions taking place in my will to enjoy. I can accelerate time or decelerate it. Everything depends on me, on my subjective perception. A Kabbalist exists simultaneously in two degrees of perception of reality: the corporeal degree, through the five physical senses, and the spiritual degree. Therefore, he exists in two realities until he reaches his final correction.

Time is a change from a corrupted state to a corrected one. Therefore, if we try to attain unity in every state, it means we accelerate time. Time is not measured by the number of seconds, but by the change from one state to the next. Therefore, a unit of time can be a minute, an hour, or a year, but it is the same unit: from descent to ascent.

By changing the connections between us, we influence the upper world and mold it into a certain form. The external form is the projection of our changes, and reflects the state of our ten. The more we connect inside the ten, the closer, kinder, and friendlier to us the external world becomes. And when we quarrel with each other, the external world grows distant and menacing to us.
[220036]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/14/18, Writings of Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar,” Item 13