Trapped in a time loop

“Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.” - Pablo Picasso, Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, stage designer, poet, and playwright.

If every child is an artist as would Pablo Picasso say, and I believe that to be true; then the problem is not how to remain an artist once he or she grows up; but how to grow up without being caught in a time loop. The process of growing up can repeat itself in a time loop notwithstanding the fact that you grow up only when you discover the strength within you that survives all hurt.

If you travel in a loop, you go round and round, as if in a merry-go-round but not necessarily merrily. And as you go round and round, the same things repeats itself. Hence trapped in a time loop means, “to get in a situation in which there is no way-out and in which the same things keep repeating themselves over and over again following the same order or process”.

Thus, if as a result you have not by now, been driven insane; be certain that you are on your way towards it. For, a time loop is a time paradox; and as a result, the world becomes a world of contradictions in which unnecessary things are our only necessities; and unnecessary habits, our only habits. Consequently, we do things, what another would have done as well or better; we say things, what another would have said as well or better; we write things, what another would have written as well or better.

Faithful

We are unable to be faithful to that which exists nowhere but in ourselves; and thus are unable to make ourselves indispensable to any cause or condition.

The result: we are caught in an irretrievable loop - a time loop. In this closed loop in time, all events become its own cause; all conditions become its own condition; and paradoxically though it may seem, life begins to imitate art far more than art imitating life.

In our life, there are two types of time loop: the physical time loop and the conscious time loop. In a physical time loop, as I explained earlier, one physically goes round and round as if in a loop; the routine of one’s action hardly changing; and in which, one does and sees the same things over-and-over.

It is akin to the routine of someone going to work who, leaves home more or less at the same time every day after doing the same kind of things at home, catches the same bus or train at the same time daily, seeing the same things and the same people over-and-over. In the space-time continuum of general relativity - a mathematical model that combines space and time into a single idea - an interwoven continuum in which space is, represented by a model in which space is three-dimensional and time has the role of the fourth dimension. Combining these two ideas helped us understand cosmology; and how the universe works - be it on the big level such as galaxies, or at the small level of atoms. Thus, all events are, defined in terms of four dimensions: three of space, and one of time, though some theories claim that there are more than four dimensions.

Dimension

Humans continuously “move” along the time dimension; where space and time loops around to form closed curves. Since the time in that region of routine is, looped; a person who wants to escape from the situation can do so only by leaving the affected area or changing the routine. Further, when one goes around in a loop, one would see an infinite number of copies of the same things in the area, unless an object left the loop. Thus, based on the number of times an object completes the loop; there would be as many copies of that object as, the number of loops completed.

This is a recurring type of time loop, not easily ended or destroyed. No wonder that many feel bored of life: their life is, caught in an endless time loop of sameness.

In a conscious time loop, everyone's consciousness loops through time. In such a time loop, causality could easily be, violated: causality being the relationship between cause and effect, or the principle that everything has a cause.

Causality, also referred to as causation, is the relation between an event (the cause) and a second event (the effect), where the second event is understood as a physical consequence of the first.

This also is the cause for our cycles of births and deaths where a persons actions cause certain effects in the current life and/or in the future life: positively or negatively. Buddhist and Hindus call it karma. However, there are various recognisable kinds of ‘cause'; candidates include objects, processes, properties, variables, facts, and states of affairs; and failure to recognise that difference, is what leads to debate.

According to the theory of action and result (karmaphala), our karmic actions are the principal cause of our happiness or suffering. From the Buddhist and Hindu point of view, a positive or wholesome action is one that will lead to greater happiness for self and others; and a negative or unwholesome action is one that will lead to greater suffering of self or others.

Conditions

Thus, everything arises in dependence upon multiple causes and conditions; nothing exists as a singular, independent entity. A traditional example used in Buddhist texts is of three sticks standing upright, leaning against each other, and supporting each other.

If one stick is, taken away, the other two will fall to the ground. However, we usually think of cause and effect as separate entities, with cause always preceding effect, and one cause leading to one effect.

This is not necessarily so. According to the teaching of Interdependent Co-Arising, cause and effect co-arise (samutpada) and everything is a result of multiple causes and conditions. Life itself is the result of multiple causes and conditions.

Hence, blame not any single cause for your sorrows. There are many interdependent things in life, which ultimately defines a given situation.

For instance, one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, can wander into our stupid life. We give them a piece of us. They did not ask for it and yet we give. They do something dumb one day, and then our life undergoes a complete transformation: it is not our own anymore. Thus, in and of itself, nothing really matters. What matters is that nothing is ever in and of itself because as human beings, we are all in the same boat, in a stormy sea; and hence, we owe each other a terrible loyalty.

None of us can ever save only ourselves; we are the instruments of one another’s salvation, and only by the hope that we give to others do we lift ourselves out of the darkness into light. Action has meaning only in relationship, and without understanding relationship, action on any level will only breed conflict.

The understanding of relationship is infinitely more important than the search for any plan of action.

Therefore, we can either, empathise with people who seem these days to mostly dwell on hatred, exclusion, and suspicion; or work with those that stress the interdependence and equality of all human beings. The choice is ours.

For views, reviews, encomiums, and brickbats:

[email protected]