The Layman's Answers to Everything

The meaning of life according to some guy who likes TV and stuff.

There seems to be a pattern that determines when Locke and the gang are jumping in time on Lost. Whether it’s Richard Alpert telling Locke what to do when he next sees him, or Faraday telling Desmond to find his mother in the future, or Locke telling Alpert to seek him out in a few years once he’s born. So far, the jumps occur whenever a character is talking to another character about events from a different time. Perhaps fate is preventing the characters from knowing something they shouldn’t be privy too or maybe it’s time’s way of course correcting, but I believe there is a deeper reason why the time jumps are happening at that exact moment. And it relates to wisdom we can use in our real lives.

Right from the start of Lost’s fifth season premiere, “Because You Left,” we learn that the island is officially capable of moving through time and space. Time travel has been a theme of Lost since at least Desmond’s mind-flashes during season three, and perhaps as far back as the “Adam and Eve” skeletons of season one. Now however, it has been unequivocally confirmed as a very real, functioning principle within the show’s mythology. Or, has it?

We all know that Lost is filled with lots of hidden clues—everything from the books the characters read and the philosophers their names are based on, to the anagrams, whispers, and backwards-talk found in many episodes. While these hints can help us to understand the show, there is something else woven into its many mysteries that is far more valuable to our everyday lives…