Clock, Time

The traditional clock shows what time it is, operates with a mechanism of endlessly rotating wheels, and is mandala-shaped with twelve points or numbers. It can chime at the sacred or "right" moment in time. (Compare Bell.) Because of these attributes, it serves not only as a symbol of time but also of fate.  

It may partly be these associations that underlie the emerging image of the entire universe as a clock, where everything ticks forward mechanically and preordained—what might be called "Chronos time." The recurring experience of clocks stopping at significant events, such as someone's death, perhaps reflects how the eternal intrudes upon our time-bound daily life, "disrupting" the timekeeper.  

The clock allows us to measure the time we live in and understand the present in relation to the past and future. It is thus an instrument of discernment (separatio) and therefore of consciousness. But time itself remains a mystery that our consciousness attempts to measure, and, for example, a magical or "impossible" clock in a dream may allude to the Great Mystery.

Time  

A specific time often indicates something we must do, something we perhaps should have done, or something we don’t yet need to do. For instance, we must drop the kids off at 7:30, be at work by 8, attend a meeting at 10, go to dinner at 7 in the evening, and so on. There is an expectation to be in a particular place and do something specific.  

If the time is "five to," it suggests that only a short time remains before something important occurs, or that one has just a brief moment to act, and so on.

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