Having or Being? — Respecting Time Without Becoming Its Prisoner
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We're so Happy you are Here! Thank you for Listening! This written companion is offered for those who enjoy reading along, reflecting, or returning to certain phrases while listening to the episode.
This morning’s random book selection landed on a passage that feels especially alive in our time—Erich Fromm’s, To Have or To Be? , is an exploration of Being and Having, and what it means to live here and now, without becoming imprisoned by time.
Fromm describes two primary modes of existence:
The Having mode, in which life is approached as something to acquire, secure, accumulate, or control. In this mode, even relationships, experiences, and time itself can become objects—means to an end, markers of success, or sources of identity.
The Being mode, by contrast, is not about possession, performance, or permanence. It is about aliveness, presence, responsiveness, and participation. Life is not something we hold; it is something we enter.
Importantly, Fromm does not ask us to reject time, desire, or material life. He reminds us that our bodies live in time and must respect its rhythms—sleep and wakefulness, effort and rest, growth and aging. The difficulty arises when time becomes our ruler rather than our companion.
In the having mode, time dominates us. We rush, plan, measure, compare, and worry. Life becomes something we are always preparing for, remembering, or managing.
In the being mode, time is respected—but it is no longer an idol. We are present within it, rather than imprisoned by it.
From this perspective, Being can be felt as a state of wholeness and receptivity. It is a way of listening to life rather than grasping at it.
A helpful guiding question—echoing both Fromm and Viktor Frankl—is not:
“What can I get from this moment?”
but rather:
“What is life asking of me, here and now?”
Not forever.Not for cultural expectations.For life itself—and for the well-being of the whole.
Seen through the lens of harmonic resonance, Being can also be understood as a tuning process. Just as in music or physics, coherent frequencies naturally attract one another. Qualities such as presence, care, curiosity, and peace tend to invite more of the same.
At the same time, we all carry many seeds within us. Fear, ambition, anger, and grasping are part of the human range. Becoming caught in these frequencies is not a moral failure—it is an invitation to notice, to soften, and to return.
This is where inner sovereignty comes in—not as force or self-judgment, but as gentle volition. The capacity to pause, listen, and choose again.
The closing practice in the episode offers a simple way to touch this return:
Pause.Breathe.Notice how you are relating to the moment.
Are you managing it—or meeting it?
You might ask yourself:What frequency am I broadcasting right now?What is alive to do in this moment?
The answer may be to act—to say yes, to celebrate connection, to honor yourself, or to say no and walk away with love in your heart.
Or the answer may be to rest.To breathe.To simply be present.
Being does not mean doing nothing. It means doing what is alive to do—without turning life into an object to possess.
And when you notice yourself caught in the time-machine—planning, chasing, grasping—let it be a moment of kindness rather than critique.
Being is always available again.
Right here.Right now.
May this reflection support you in respecting time without becoming its prisoner, and in continuing to tune yourself to the harmonic resonance of life.
May All Beings Be Free. May All Beings Be Loved and Safe. May All Beings Be at Peace. Thank you!
