Stepping outside of time and space

The power of ultimate presence

Photo by Jr Korpa on Unsplash

Note: This is a piece about events in my recent life, but I’d encourage you to read it as if it’s about you. How do you step out of time? What experiences have you had where this has happened? After you read the piece, let me know in the comments. ✨

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For the last two weeks, I’ve doing some preliminary research for a project I’m starting in 2025.

One of my conversations was with a human I wrote about in my piece “The Moment Time Stopped.” We shared an experience that appeared to exist outside of traditional time and space, and the piece was my reflection on it.

From that piece, which I wrote back in January:

I’ve learned this moment was one for me where time… stopped.

Everything, and nothing, collapsed together and for a solitary second of naked truth, it was evident “what we’re doing here.”

It might have been a second, a second where I stared into two blue eyes, and I saw in them a soul contract woven since before my body origin; an agreement, an understanding that we’re here to remind one another why… we’re here. It was… infinite. It was… serendipity. And, then it was over.

That second felt like two years, but every other minute was played at 4x speed. Two years, and then seconds. Rushing seconds, and then two years.

It may have been a second, but that second happened at the same time as a moment of infinity in what I perceive as years ago. All of the time and experience in between somehow disappeared from that moment. There was little “catching up.” There was barely “tell me what you’ve been up to.”

It was a moment of ultimate presence, a moment of “now.” Everything was as it was, and we knew one another, even though we didn’t.

At one point he said to me

“I’m sorry. I feel like I’m dominating this conversation.”

“That’s why we’re here,” I said.

I knew for us, that was my role at that moment. We’d stepped out of time, and I could see floating above all of it, above everything, the infinity of the rest. I could see it, how the rest would go. Just for a second, I could see everything.

The man I wrote about in that piece has been a mentor of mine.

He was my direct supervisor, but he was not a career mentor. Rather, he served very much as a reminder of who I am and where I am to lead myself in life. He introduced me to consciousness and the idea that time and space are illusory. He was one of the first people I knew who consciously created life, not just lived it as a byproduct of perceived circumstance.

That moment I wrote about in January is now 10 months in the past, but when we spoke recently, he referred to it as “the other day.”

Granted, he was very tired and probably had been awake for 30+ hours when he said that. It was curious for me, though, that he used that language, especially since I had written so profoundly about how it felt like, together, we stepped out of time.

This happens with people when they are in ultimate presence.

Ultimate presence is a state of being “in love.”

There’s a quote in the movie Big Fish that I love.

It says:

“They say when you meet the love of your life, time stops, and that's true. What they don't tell you is that once time starts again, it moves extra fast to catch up.”

Love is another way that “time stops.” When you fall in love, life and time seem illusory. Everything is “out of time.” I think this video from the movie illustrates this perfectly.

When I talk about the state of being “in love,” I don’t just mean romantic love. I mean the state where we just are, and we are with one another completely. There’s nothing else to be, do, or experience. We step “out of time.”

I was thinking this morning of other ways that “time stops.”

Last year, Martin introduced me to the “Rough Nights,” (or “Smoke Nights,”) also called “Rauhnächte.” They are the holy days at the end of the year that begin around the solstice and continue until the new year. Some traditions have them beginning at Christmas and going until January 6. He sent me this article if you’d like to read more about them.

When we moved from the lunar calendar to the Gregorian calendar, there were many days left over. Thus, they added these “leap days—” the rough nights.

From this article (translated into English):

“The origin of Rauhnächte comes from the difference between the days in the solar year, which is 365 days, and the so-called lunar year, which is 354 days. To compensate for this difference, the Celts added eleven leap days, i.e. twelve nights, which would actually not have existed without this addition. Therefore they will Rauhnächte also often as holy nights between the years designated. It is said that on these special days the laws of nature as we know them can be overridden so that the gates to the subtle world are open.”

I don’t deeply partake in the tradition, but as a human who has been alive for a little while now, I’ve noticed that time, and the concept of time, feels different during the “rough nights” period.

I even used to tell my clients that “December gives us the feeling of toppling down an escalator” because it’s actually a 20-day month. Nothing happens after December 20. Why is it so?

I believe that our concept of time gets distorted.

I used to think it had to do with my job in Times Square, but even in the pandemic year and the years after when I was completely self-employed (thus on my own “time”) I experienced the same phenomenon during the rough nights. Time was an illusion. Nothing in the sky was moving. People shift about but they don’t really accomplish anything. It’s like the universal motor idles.

I was compelled to write this this morning because I believe that when we sit together in love, we can create a container that exists outside of time.

It happens in powerful coaching sessions and in ultimate presence in conversation. We are reminded of who we are when we connect with that level of depth.

This week, I’d been feeling inundated by pressure in my physical manifestation. The smells and sounds of it have had me exhausted, and my brain has been grasping to smaller things it can control, leaving me burned out and lingering in anhedonia.

Anhedonia: the inability to experience joy or pleasure.

I reached out to someone I loved, but I didn’t receive the response I hoped for. It’s no one’s fault; it just didn’t go the way I perhaps thought it might. But, I did ask myself after I reached out why I reached out.

I realized it’s because I have stepped out of time and space in the past with this person. When outside of time and space, we are reminded of who we are. Everything inside of time and space becomes almost laughable by that point.

The job worry? It’s clear and obvious.

The email issue? Who the fuck cares?

The irritation about the way that conference went? Psh.

The rough flight? How stupid.

Outside of time and space, everything has a clear answer.

That’s why it’s imperative to practice a disconnect from The Matrix once per day. I notice when I don’t do that, my body becomes an anxiety super factory.

(Layman’s terms- get on the cushion, close your eyes, and breathe. Sometimes, I don’t do “the cushion,” but rather, I plop my entire body down on the Earth.)

As I was combing through the files of recent experience, trying to understand how I got so depressed, I came to a powerful realization: I am the one who takes us outside of time and space.

I have been attributing the sole power to others, even certain specific others. But really, it’s me. I know it is so because I am ultimately present.

I have that power.

In coaching conversations.

In moments of deep eye contact.

In moments where I speak.

I create those power blocks.

It’s me.

I think that the best thing about stepping out of time, the moments of deep love, of deep presence, is that reminder of more profound truth.

We live in an age now where everyone is trying to peddle you some garbage information. What if the best thing that could happen is a reminder of who you really are? If someone could give you that, the “mojo,” the “vigor,” the permission to unapologetically carve out a sexy piece of life with the vitality of an 18-year-old in a Ferrari, what value would you place on it?

It’s not here in manifestation. It all lies outside … in the magic.

Stay beautiful.