How I Learned to Be Present—One Sound at a Time

“Time isn’t the main thing. It’s the only thing.” ~Miles Davis

When I first read that quote, it hit me right in the chest. Not because it sounded profound—but because it was something I had been slowly, painfully learning over the course of a very quiet, very long year.

Time used to feel like a race. Or maybe a shadow. Or a trickster. Some days, it slipped through my fingers like water. Other days, it dragged me along like a heavy cart. But always, it was something outside me—something I was chasing or trying to escape.

I spent much of my life impatient. Not in the obvious, tapping-your-foot kind of way, but in the quiet, internal kind of way: the constant sense that something should be happening, or happening faster, or already have happened by now. I measured life by milestones—achievements, breakthroughs, arrivals. I told myself I was being productive, but really, I was just uncomfortable with stillness.

The Turning Point: Time Isn’t Linear

Before all this, I thought of sound as something external—music, noise, conversation. But Nada Yoga transformed that understanding. In the stillness of those long days, sound became an anchor. Even the hum of the heater or the ticking of the clock became companions. When I gave them my full attention, they stopped being background noise and became part of the present moment.

This is when I began to understand that time isn’t as linear as I had always believed. The past and future were ideas playing out in my mind, but the sound of now—the tone, the breath, the subtle vibration in my chest—was undeniable. And every time I tuned into it, I found myself grounded again.

Physics agrees in strange ways. Einstein called time a “stubbornly persistent illusion,” and in the language of relativity, time doesn’t pass in the way we feel it does. Some physicists believe that the past, present, and future all exist at once—that time isn’t a straight line, but more like a landscape we move through. What we experience as “now” depends on where we’re standing, so to speak—our frame of reference.

It’s not that time isn’t real—it’s that our experience of it is shaped by attention, memory, and movement.

This insight doesn’t make time feel less urgent, but it reframes it. If time is an illusion, it may be less about seconds ticking by and more about awareness itself. What we call “now” isn’t a slice between before and after—it’s a field we enter through presence. That’s why mindfulness and Nada Yoga matter here: they’re not just techniques for coping—they’re ways of seeing.

In the teachings of the Eightfold Path, this felt most connected to Right Mindfulness and Right Concentration. But instead of striving to perfect these steps, I simply allowed sound to lead me there. Following the thread of vibration was a practice in presence. It didn’t matter what time the clock said. The only real moment was the one I could hear, feel, and meet with openness.

When Time Moves Too Fast

Eventually, I began to feel better. My body regained strength, and my thinking was clearer. I started doing more, breathing more slowly, walking farther, making plans. But with that return came a different kind of challenge: the speed of life.

It’s incredible how quickly we can forget stillness once momentum kicks back in. Emails. Errands. The endless list of things we should’ve already done. I was “back,” but I noticed something curious—I missed the slow time. Not the discomfort, but the spaciousness. The simplicity. The depth I had discovered when life wasn’t asking me to move so fast.

I tried to hold onto what I’d learned. I’d remind myself that presence doesn’t need to be complicated—listening to a soft drone or resting in the inner hum I could still feel when I paid attention. That tiny ritual became a way to soften the edges of my days. It reminded me that even when life is loud and fast, there is still something quiet underneath, waiting.

And once again, I turned to the Eightfold Path, this time to Right Effort. Not effort as in struggle, but the gentle discipline to return, to listen, to not forget myself in the rush. Patience, it turns out, isn’t something you master once and for all. It’s something you practice again and again in small, quiet ways.

The Sound of Patience

What surprised me most was realizing that patience has a sound. It’s not always silence.

Sometimes, it’s the low hum of the fridge at midnight. Sometimes, it’s the steady beat of a distant drum in a piece of music. Sometimes, it’s just my own breath or heartbeat or pulse, reminding me that I am here.

And presence has its own rhythm too. The more I tuned in, the more I saw how much time opens up when I stop resisting it. A few mindful minutes can feel full and rich. A rushed hour can feel like nothing at all.

We say “time flies” when we’re enjoying ourselves—but I’ve found something deeper: time expands when we’re fully present. When I listen—really listen—to what is here, I don’t feel late. I don’t feel behind. I feel whole.

This doesn’t mean I’ve figured it all out. I still lose patience. I still check the clock too much. But now, I have a practice to return to—a practice built not on perfection, but on sound, breath, and the quiet trust that everything unfolds in its own time.

The longer I walk this path, the more I see that my suffering around time wasn’t really about minutes or hours. It was about resistance. It was about the belief that the present moment was never quite enough. That I had to get somewhere, become someone, achieve something before I could rest.

But through mindfulness, and especially through the practice of listening—whether to the soft whispering tones of the wind in Nada Yoga or to the ordinary sounds of daily life—I’ve discovered a gentler truth:

The present moment isn’t something we earn. It’s something we enter.

And when we do, when we stop fighting time and start listening to it, we find something unexpected—not emptiness, but richness. Not waiting, but arrival.

A Closing Reflection

There’s a soft drone of reticulated sounds playing as I write this now. A deep tone that barely shifts but somehow holds me steady. It reminds me to breathe. It reminds me to slow down. It reminds me that I am not behind—I am here.

I think that’s the real gift of both mindfulness and Nada Yoga. Not to help us “make the most of our time,” but to help us feel time differently—not as a pressure, but as a presence.

And so I leave you with this:

Next time you feel rushed or restless, stop. Close your eyes. Listen for the quietest sound in the room—or in you. It might not be music, or even beautiful, but it will be real. And in that sound, however small, you might find a doorway to now.

And now, as Miles Davis said, time is not just the main thing—it’s the only thing.

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