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The following is an excerpt of the book Simple Abundance by Sarah Ban Breathnach:

“In order to know a semblance of serenity during the days of our lives, we also need to discover Time’s twin nature, which the ancient Greeks called chronos and kairos.

Chronos is clocks, deadlines, watches, calendars, agendas, planners, schedules, beepers. Chronos is time at her worst. Chronos keeps track. Chronos is a delusion of grandeur. Chronos is running the Marine Corps marathon in heels. In chronos we think only of ourselves. Chronos is the world’s time.

Kairos is transcendence, infinity, reverence, joy, passion, love, the Sacred. Kairos is intimacy with the Real. Kairos is time at her best. Kairos lets go. In kairos we escape the dungeon of self. Kairos is a Schubert waltz in nineteenth-century Vienna with your soul mate. Kairos is Soul’s time.

We exist in chronos. We long for kairos. That is our duality. Chronos requires speed so that it won’t be wasted. Kairos requires space so that it might be savored. We do in chronos. In kairos we are allowed to be.

We think we’ve never known kairos, but we have: when making love, when meditating or praying, when lost in music’s rapture or literature’s reverie, when planting bulbs or pulling weeds, when watching over a sleeping child, when reading the Sunday comics together in bed, when delighting in a sunset, when exulting in our passions. We know joy in kairos, glimpse beauty in kairos, remember what it means to be alive in kairos, reconnect with our Divinity in kairos.

So how do we exchange chronos for kairos?
- By slowing down
- By concentrating on one thing at a time
- By going about whatever we are doing as if it were the only thing worth doing at that moment.
- By pretending we have all the time in the world, so that our subconscious will kick in and make it so.
- By making time.
- By taking time.
- It only takes a moment to cross over from chronos into kairos, but it does take a moment.
All that kairos asks is our willingness to stop running long enough to hear the music of the spheres.
Today, be willing to join in the dance.
Now you’re in kairos.”

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