Have you ever had an experience of timelessness?

Timelessness is that state of mind when time does not seem to matter or when time seems suspended and is no longer passing. It is those points, episodes and events in our life when time no longer flows or when we are totally unaware of its passage. I remember spending ten days in the Boundary Waters in Northern Minnesota. It took about a week but eventually I stopped thinking of time and looking at my watch. I became almost totally unaware of the passage of time. Life seemed to slow down so that each moment I focused on could have lasted forever. Only the shifting of my thoughts caused any movement in the world. Schedules, to-do-lists, appointments all disappeared.

I rested when I wanted to, paddled when and where I wanted to, ate and napped when I wanted to and not by the movements of the hands on my watch. Time became non-existent except by virtue of the sun, moon and stars. Clock time, machine time, watch time, 24 hour schedules no longer existed for me. Upon leaving the Boundary Waters, it took a few days for me to adjust to “reentry.” I had to adjust again to a world where we take our breaks on a schedule and work x number of hours each day until the weekend signals a break.

Have you ever experienced a state of timelessness? When was the last time that time no longer mattered for you? What events or episodes in your life have evoked a state of timelessness for you? What where they like? Did you find them enjoyable? Do you wish you could have more experiences of timelessness? How often do you have any experiences of timelessness? Do you suppose this is a skill that could be developed or do you think it just happens? What if you could develop a skill to create timelessness whenever you wanted to? What would life be like for you if you could suspend time whenever you wanted or needed to?