THE REALITY OF TIME ... is NOT WHAT YOU THINK

In Physics, time is a measure. It measures the relative changing positions of objects in motion. No Movement - No Time. 

If we were to freeze the universe where all comes to a halt, time ceases to exist. There is no change. No way to measure.

But the universe is not static, it is moving.

Mass and energy follow the classical laws of physics. Once an object is set in motion it stays in motion unless acted upon by another force. 

The motion of all inanimate objects strictly follows the laws of physics. If there is no interference by a lifeform, every movement can be charted and positions known throughout the universe indefinitely into the future.

We command our bodies with our minds. We can change the course of material the universe set in motion by a willed decision. If a stone is rolling down a hill, we can pick it up and change the natural path determined by the laws of physics. 

As we navigate our environment, however, we need to operate within the limits of the laws of physics. We can lift a stone but we can't lift a boulder.

We learn how to move within the restrictions of the environment by trial and error. We don't need to know a thing about physics to experience how the forces of nature affect us.

Thought and speech are forms of internal motion in the mind. 

A sentence is made up of a sequence of individual words. When we speak, one word follows another. Each word is only occurring in the present. As each spoken word follows the next the mind processes the sequence. We are observing motion in the mind. The mind puts the words together and interprets the string as a complete thought.

Mind motion is completely independent of physical motion. 

Mind motion follows a sequence until the subject changes. Then the sequence is broken and any resulting sequential action is reset. 

All Motion, physical and mind, is always circling the present. 

Let's say you ask someone to bring you a book sitting over there on a table. The other person responds, gets the book and hands it to you. The person's motion has changed the position of an inanimate object, the book, leaving a new configuration of the ever changing present. Left to the forces of the physical world, the book remains stationary in its place, predictably in the present indefinitely.

As the earlier inhabitants of our world watched the sky they saw the periodic motion of the earth in relation to the sun. They assigned units of measure to the consistent changes. They named them years, months, days, hours, minutes, seconds ... 

The sun rises and sets with predictable accuracy giving us days and nights with regular occurrence. Clocks are designed to measure the intervals of change. 

Our clocks tick off the hours, minutes and seconds of each day. Each tick a changing moment of right now. A shuffling of all that exists. Moving about the set amount of mass and energy in our universe that's simply rearranging. 

Our observations of the ticking clocks lead us to believe time is moving forward at a constant rate. But as knowledge increased over the centuries it was discovered time passes at different speeds depending on how fast an object is moving or the strength of a field of gravity. The faster the motion or the stronger the gravity, the slower time runs relative to another object. 

Einstein shed light on the counterintuitive reality of time with the Theory of Relativity, which is an accepted fact today. 

'Time Dilation' tells us as a moving object approaches the speed of light, time approaches zero. 

Einstein gives an example with the 'Twin Paradox'.  

Two twins start together on earth. One stays behind while the other travels into space at a very high speed then returns. When they reunite, the traveling twin is younger than the one who stayed on earth. 

If each twin sets its watch to the same time when they part, the clocks will read differently for the twin in the spaceship compared to the clock for the twin on earth. But the clocks for each twin appear to tick away at the same rate. When the traveling twin returns to earth many years later, the twin on earth has aged according to earth years, while the traveling twin is relatively younger. Each clock will no longer be in sync.

The relative motion is defining the local measure of time.