The Essence of Time: A Reflection on Life’s Greatest Illusion

Time.

We chase it, measure it, and try to control it. We speak of it as though it is something to be managed—something that exists outside of us. We live by its demands, tethered to calendars, alarms, and schedules, always anticipating the next moment, always reaching for the next thing.

Yet, time itself is indifferent to our constructs. It does not belong to the hands of a clock or the pages of a planner. It does not exist in meeting invites, deadlines, or digital reminders. We try to confine it, but it moves beyond our grasp, refusing to be possessed or contained.

Recently, I experienced time in its purest form.

I sat by my grandmother’s side as she took her final breaths on the afternoon of Thursday, 6th February, and in that sacred moment, all external notions of time ceased to exist. The clocks on the walls, the structure of the days, the markers of routine—all of it faded into irrelevance. What remained was something more profound, more eternal.

I saw time for what it truly is.

It is not found in the rush of life but in its stillness. It is not found in productivity but in presence. It is not counted in minutes but in meaning.

As I held her hand, I felt the rhythm of her breath—each inhale, a quiet arrival; each exhale, a gentle release. There was no past or future in those moments, only the now. The purest expression of time was not in its passing, but in the depth of its presence.

We often say time is fleeting, slipping away from us like sand through our hands. But what if time is not slipping away? What if it is we who are moving—passing through moments, carried forward by the impermanence of our existence?

My grandmother’s passing was not an end. It was a reminder. A profound lesson whispered in the silence of her last moments.

The Truth About Time

Time does not live in numbers; it lives in the spaces between them. It is not found in the ticking of a clock but in the quiet pauses between heartbeats. It does not exist in the things we do but in the way we are.

We do not make time; we are time. We do not lose time; we experience it.

Time is the warmth of a hug that lingers even after arms have let go. Time is the sound of laughter echoing in the spaces of our hearts long after the moment has passed. Time is the way love stretches beyond mortality, how it lives on in the stories we tell and the lives we touch.

My grandmother’s time was not measured by the years she lived but by the love she gave. The time she spent with us was not about its duration but about its depth.

And I wonder—how often do we miss time because we are looking for it in the wrong places?

We think time is something we can own, something we can accumulate or spend wisely. But time does not belong to us. We belong to time.

We are given the illusion that time is something we can run out of, yet the greatest loss is not time itself but the moments we fail to be present for. We mourn the passing of time, fearing that it is leaving us behind, but in truth, time is always here, waiting for us to be in it fully.

Honouring Time Through Presence

In the days that followed my grandmother’s passing, I found myself slowing down. I began to notice things I had long overlooked—the way the morning light shifts through my window, the way the wind moves through the trees, the way a single deep breath can centre me back into the moment.

I realised that to honour time is to honour life itself.

It is to sit in the quiet and listen. It is to be with the people we love, fully and completely, without distraction. It is to cherish the simple, ordinary moments that, in the end, are the ones that matter the most.

So, I ask myself—how do I wish to spend my time? Not in the sense of productivity, but in the sense of presence.

I want to spend time loving fiercely, without hesitation. I want to spend time listening deeply, with my heart open. I want to spend time living authentically, not in pursuit of a distant future, but rooted in the beauty of the present moment.

Because when my own time comes to an end, I will not ask how much I achieved or how many hours I worked. I will not look back on my to-do lists or count the number of days I lived.

I will ask only this— Did I love enough? Did I savour the moments that mattered? Did I let time move through me, rather than trying to outrun it?

And in that final breath, if I can say yes to these questions, then I will know— My time was never wasted. My time was never lost. My time was always here, in the space between heartbeats, in the breath of life itself.

Because time is not something we find. It is something we become.

And in becoming time, we finally learn how to live.