Time and Persona – How Calendars, Clocks and Linear Thinking Mold Us

From the moment we’re born, we’re conditioned to measure life by artificial constructs—hours, days, years. But time, as we know it, isn’t just a neutral tool. It’s a framework that deeply influences how we see ourselves, our productivity, our value, and even our purpose.

The journey toward full awareness and clarity through Natural Law begins by applying what is objective, observable, and repeatable. When we are introduced into society, we are given systems such as the Roman Gregorian calendar, rooted in ancient traditions and rituals which was developed ancient Egypt. The Egyptian solar calendar was based on the annual heliacal rising of the star Sirius (also known as Sothis), which coincided with the flooding of the Nile River. The sun was central to their religious beliefs, with the sun god Ra being one of the most prominent deities. As truth-seekers, we might find some comfort in the seemingly reliable patterns of this calendar. However, a deeper examination reveals that many of its assumptions are misplaced.

The Illusion of the 24-Hour Day
We commonly accept that each day has 24 hours, but this standard is based on the solar day—the time it takes for the sun to return to the same point in the sky. However, this isn’t the actual rotation period of Earth.

The sidereal day—based on the Earth’s rotation relative to the stars—is about 23 hours, 56 minutes. The Sidereal alignment is the only form of measurement which allows us to be aware of the true time we have lived.That means every day, there’s nearly a 4-minute discrepancy between the true rotation of the Earth and our clock-based time.

Over time, this builds up:

• Each Solar year: Each year, 23h 57m 15s are silently added to our lives—not through experience, but through abstraction. This unseen day doesn’t mark a breath taken or a rotation felt, yet it shapes our age and our story.

• Over 50 years: A solar timekeeper would experience about 50 less full Earth rotations than someone counting sidereal years.

This subtle distortion shows how even our sense of age and duration is shaped by an artificial lens. When someone turns 50 by the solar calendar, they have actually experienced 50 days less than what is measured in sidereal time. If we count life in minutes, not in seasonal alignment, we find a tangible difference.

If no calendar existed today, how would we recreate one? We would begin with what is directly observable—the movements of the stars, the cycles of the Moon, the seasons, and our own biological rhythms. The Roman calendar, however, is based not on what is purely observable, but on subjective interpretations of Earth's orbit around the Sun, giving rise to artificial constructs like the 24-hour day.

This calendar emerged from Sun-worship traditions, influenced by Egyptian and Babylonian systems, and was later refined by the Roman Empire for agriculture, taxation, and political control. The very names of the days reflect these influences: Sol (Sunday), Luna (Monday), Mars (Tuesday), Mercury (Wednesday), Jupiter (Thursday), Venus (Friday), and Saturn (Saturday)—each representing a deity tied to a planetary or celestial archetype.

Deuteronomy 4: 19 -20 ESV - "And beware lest you raise your eyes to heaven, and when you see the sun and the moon and the stars, ball the host of heaven, you be drawn away and bow down to them and serve them, things that the Lord your God has allotted to all the peoples under the whole heaven. 20 But the Lord has taken you and brought you out of the iron furnace, out of Egypt, to be a people of his own inheritance, as you are this day."

While the Sun is vital to life, it is not the source of life itself—it is a servant to it. From a Natural Law perspective, Life—not light alone—is the higher principle. The Earth and Sun serve Life, not the other way around. True awareness comes not from worshiping what shines, but from understanding what it serves.

So what is the difference between prioritizing Life over the Sun? If we based our systems on Life, our calendars would reflect consistency, rhythm, and natural intelligence. They would resemble ancient sidereal or lunar calendars, where each month has 28 days, and each anniversary returns to the same day — repeatable, observable, and aligned with the cycles of life itself. In contrast, the Roman Sun-worship calendar shifts year to year, adjusting to the Sun's position relative to Earth — as if Earth were a fixed point, rather than a living, moving being in a vast, dynamic cosmos.

We know the Earth rotates, evolves, and breathes. Why then should we base our lives on a system that ignores its motion and sacred rhythm? Natural Law invites us to simplify life by creating systems that are consistent, reliable, and do not require constant correction. When we focus on Life as the primary aspect of creation — Life as a sacred gift from the Divine, from the Creator of All, including the Sun — we shift our orientation from the Earth’s orbit around the Sun to the Earth’s own rotation and the Life it nurtures. This shift in awareness helps us understand why ancient cultures aligned with sidereal calendars: because they are observable and repeatable. Unlike the Gregorian calendar, which is artificial, temporal, and often confusing, sidereal time reflects the living rhythm of Earth and the cosmos.

Even the calendar itself has a political history. When Pope Gregory XIII introduced the Gregorian calendar in 1582, many Protestant nations resisted its adoption—not because the astronomy was flawed, but because the reform came from the Vatican. To accept it was to submit, symbolically, to papal authority. For centuries, Protestant regions like England and parts of Germany continued using the Julian calendar, treating time not just as a measurement—but as a battleground of identity, sovereignty, and control. This tension reveals that the very structure by which we track our days is deeply tied to who holds power over our perception of reality.

By focusing on the Sidereal Calendar, we shift our attention to the Earth’s rotation—on Life itself, on the living Earth, and on the living being within you. In Natural Law, we do not define people by their age; we recognize what is. That is, we look at the human before us: a man, a woman, someone healthy, young, or old, recognizance them in the cycle of a Human Life—not as numbers, but as living expressions of the present. We do not rely on an abstract figure attached to the person to form assumptions about who they are. We respond to what is here, now. In Natural Law, truth is observable and current—not encoded in digits, but reflected in direct experience. To understand this is to realize that celebrating your birthday according to the Roman calendar is fundamentally misleading. It implies that you’ve lived a precise number of days on Earth, but this is inaccurate when we measure time by the Earth’s rotation rather than its orbit. The date is symbolic, not reflective of your actual time lived.

Now you know—your age is but a number, a symbol etched upon a shifting calendar. In the eyes of the Divine, each day you are alive is a holy return, a quiet miracle. Each sunrise is a rebirth, each breath a testament to your sacred presence. Why limit your celebration to one day when Life itself celebrates you daily? You are not bound by time—you are part of the eternal rhythm. Honor your being not once a year, but with every heartbeat, every awakening, every now.

Linear Time and the Birth of Persona

The moment we start tracking hours, deadlines, and annual milestones, we begin shaping our identity to fit time’s structure.

We learn:

To wake and sleep on command.
To divide life into work, weekends, and holidays.
To mark worth by achievements tied to specific ages.

This structure feeds the persona—the social mask we wear to meet expectations. Time becomes the rhythm to which we perform.

A child learns to be “on time.”
A student learns to perform by semester.
An adult defines success by how far they’ve gone “by 30.”

Over time, we internalize linear time as identity: productive = valuable. Delayed = failed.


The Forgotten 13th Month

The Gregorian calendar gives us 12 months—but based on lunar and sidereal rhythms, there are 13 true moon cycles in a solar year. Each moon cycle is about 28 days. Thirteen of these cycles equal 364 days, aligning closely with the natural year. Yet we only get paid for 12 months of work while we live and labor for 13 cycles.

This silent compression of time has consequences:
Workers unknowingly give more than they’re compensated for.
Our biological and spiritual rhythms (especially in women) are disconnected from lunar flow.
Time becomes a commodity, not a sacred rhythm.
Cultural Conditioning and Linear

Time Calendars do more than organize. They indoctrinate. Religious holidays, school years, retirement age—all of these social rituals create fixed checkpoints in life. This creates what some call “temporal domestication”:
You graduate at 18.
Work full-time by 22.
Marry and have children before 35.
Retire at 65.

Anyone outside this rhythm risks being seen as lost, lazy, or rebellious. The persona adapts to stay inside the box of time-defined legitimacy.

Reclaiming Embodied Time
Before calendars, there were seasons, moon cycles, and star paths. Before clocks, there were heartbeat, breath, and circadian rhythms. Returning to natural time doesn’t mean abandoning tools—it means awakening to how deeply we’ve internalized time’s pressure. You are not late. You are not early. You are here. We can begin to: Honor the 13-moon calendar. Sync with our inner tides. See age not as decline, but as unfolding. Time can be a garden, not a treadmill.

Persona Beyond the Clock
We are more than our calendars. More than our to-do lists. More than the numbers that mark our lives. When we stop defining ourselves by hours worked or milestones reached, we start reclaiming our true rhythm—one that breathes with the Earth, with the stars, and with the quiet knowing of the soul. The persona shaped by time doesn’t have to rule us. We can take off the watch.

"Step off the grid. And remember that time, in its purest form, is presence."

Dedicated to Liz Soer