“All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” These are the words Gandalf said to Frodo as he lamented the ring and the pain that came with bearing it. While none of us are in possession of a ring as Frodo was, we have been given time and the decision of what we must do with it. The framework of time seeps into our every thought and overshadows every decision we make.
We treat time as a distant being, watching over our every move and demanding we make sacrifices in order that we may pass into the next day. Our mindset is that our only use for time is in a way that benefits us most. This is not the case at all. Time is not a constraint; it is a wide open door.
An open door is not always positive, however. Time presents us with an opportunity to gain power that we can use to build a stone wall to keep everyone else far away. We can also use that power to tear apart the stone wall and build a bridge. We must use our time with wisdom and respect for the power that it presents us with. When we view time as a constraint, we are more likely to grab at that power, our hands dripping with greed like a child grabbing for a toy with no regard for the desire of the other children who also grab for the toy, some more aggressively than others.
Time is personal to us, and in our Western culture it has become invaluable, a force that shapes our society. To strengthen our future, we must seek to understand the complexities of the frameworks that so profoundly impact our society. With each societal framework we must confront the decision Gandalf brought to Frodo: what will we do with what we have been given? With every societal force we are given, we are also given the opportunity to abuse that force, an opportunity we inherently take as human beings. If we do not recognize our inherent abuse frameworks such as time, we will certainly be unable to recognize the victims of this abuse. Time is abused when our children are shot in schools and our legislators do nothing. Time is abused when we are too preoccupied with advancing ourselves to notice those who have seemingly been forgotten in our western economy of time. Our abuse of time strengthens our stone walls but weakens the bridge to our future.
In his song “It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleeding),” Bob Dylan writes, “he not busy being born is busy dying.” As Gandalf and Bob Dylan said with such wisdom, we must be active with our time. We must make a decision of how to use it. We cannot float through life oblivious to our surroundings. Do we fight to keep time for ourselves or do we share it with those around us? With every breath we take we are either dying or pull- ing ourselves into the next seconds, minutes, days, and years of our lives. Likewise, with every breath we are either killing our brothers and sisters or hoisting them onto our shoulders as we take one more step on our journey. Time is both a healer and a noose around our necks. Our decision is either to heal or to usher in death far before its time.
On the surface, the comments on time from Gandalf and Bob Dylan may seem simple, as if they lacked depth. Thoughtful simplicity is often times much deeper than long, drawn out explanations. Our everyday views of time are often of simplicity as well, but the ramifications of our decisions ripple throughout our lives as if we had thrown a pebble into a pond. Sometimes the waves are hidden and other times they pound the shoreline, washing up the debris buried deep inside our lives.
Whether or not the effects of the decisions we make on how we spend our time are immediately visible or not, they will reach the shore. We may see our storms within our lifetimes. It may be years after our death before the erosion on the shore is noticed. Our decisions can slowly degrade the shoreline we so critically rely on. No matter how simple our decisions with time seem, they are some of the most complex we will make.
This is not an indictment of politics or politicians. It is not an indictment of age, race, or social status. It is an indictment of our disrespect for our fellow human beings. It is an indictment of our need to be at the top of our social structures. It is an indictment of us, an indictment of our lack of understanding of the influence our decisions have on those around us. When we abuse time we sign our own death warrants, and with every second that passes we bring our family, our neighbors, and our brothers and sisters we have never met to a gathering at our burying ground.
When we open our eyes to every second and look around us and think critically of our views and actions and decide what we will do with the time we have been given, only then will we be born, only then will we have life.
