Almost 40 years ago I found myself hoping, despite opposition from mainstream medicine, that the mind-body connection would be accepted as real. That came to pass, but there’s another horizon opening up, the quantum horizon. In my new book, Quantum Body, I propose that we will understand both mind and body only when we trace them to the source they share, which is the quantum field.

To say that you have a quantum body sounds far removed from everyday life. So let’s begin with something that affects everyday life for everyone: time. Time is as mysterious as life itself. As a statement of fact, this is undeniable. Everything about a living cell is timed. Cells know when to divide, which requires DNA to split down the middle like a genetic zipper.

Each half rebuilds the entire double helix through precise molecular timing, one half working from front to back, the other half from back to front. So-called molecular machines oversee this process, which isn’t continuous but sometimes requires a pause. Once the two halves are whole again, the rest of the cell must parcel itself out so that a perfect replica of every part, including the outside membrane, seamlessly emerges.

What we’re talking about is a complete mastery of time—and there are thousands of other processes involved because your body doesn’t run on a single clock (or biorhythm). It synchronizes a bewildering number of clocks, each with its own duration. Quantum biology has come closer to unraveling how time affects aging and disease than any previous theory. The basic points you have already met with.

• Entropy degrades the use of energy inside a cell. As time passes, quantum errors cause energy to be used less efficiently.

• The tiniest local errors in a cell have consequences that spread to other cells, then to tissues, organs, and the whole body.

• The degradation of energy gives a quantum explanation for why we age and get sick.

• Time therefore is the culprit that invisibly robs us of life, and its behavior cannot be understood without going to the quantum level. 

These points are accurate but frustrating at the same time. Going to the quantum level is a mathematical journey as far as physics is concerned. Using advanced computation and artificial intelligence, an overwhelming amount of data can be extracted about quantum biology. Somewhere in this data are clues to the astonishing mastery of time that comes effortlessly to every cell in your body. 

But there is also a conceptual wall that must be faced. No one knows where time comes from. On this side of the Big Bang time, space, matter, and energy organize the cosmos. On the other side of the Big Bang lies unknown territory, and unfortunately, no data can be extracted from it.

Not just the origin of time is baffling. Examine the body’s biological clocks, and all kinds of things are just as baffling. To take just one, how does the body synchronize long-range time (including the loss of baby teeth for mature teeth, the onset of puberty, and the arrival of menstruation), mid-range time (including the cycles of digestion, hormones, and sleep), and short-range time (including thousands of nearly instantaneous chemical processes at the cellular level)?

If you focus on this single mystery, a quantum clue emerges. Behind the body’s ability to synchronize time, the timeless must be at work. That’s because whatever organizes all these biological clocks isn’t on a timer. Otherwise, who or what times it? Imagine yourself sitting on the bank of a river. You can only know the speed of the water’s current by not floating downstream with it. Just as there must be a vantage point outside the river, the quantum field gives a vantage point outside time. 

This vantage point has a surprising name: now. Now is outside time. All the regulation, control, computation, and intelligence implied by your body’s time cycles occur in the now. Your body assembles everything it needs effortlessly, and it does this here and now. One might truthfully say that the wisdom of the body is the wisdom of now. 

It is the teeming, active mind that finds the present moment so elusive. Your body has no such problem. Cells are always present—they have to be to survive. Moreover, there is an unbroken line connecting each cell to the quantum field. If a cell could voice what this connection brings, it would say that the now

Is always new

Knows what is needed at all times

Refreshes the experience of being alive

Contains vibrant energy

Has no regrets about the past or apprehension for the future.

Your quantum body is the invisible form that makes the connection personal. It is the conjunction of time and the timeless. Once you realize this, you have taken the most important step to being in the present moment: Stop believing that you can get there by thinking, feeling, believing, hoping, or any other mental process. The wisdom of now, as your body already knows in its trillions of cells, is embedded in existence itself. Without this wisdom, a cell cannot exist. The illusion that you can exist without the wisdom of now must be discarded.

I’ve only sketched in an outline of Quantum Body and the new horizons opened up by making the quantum personal. The ultimate reason you don’t need to seek the present moment is that it is already finding you instead. It is happening in silence. If the silent gap were empty, spiritual life would be just as empty and human awareness a void. But in reality, infinite possibilities exist in your awareness, and the gap between thoughts is the portal for activating these possibilities. To be conscious of this reality takes you out of all illusions. You gain a lifelong motivation for valuing the gifts of the now and doing everything you can to live by them. 

DEEPAK CHOPRA MD, FACP, FRCP, founder of The Chopra Foundation, a non-profit entity for research on well-being and humanitarianism, and Chopra Global, a whole health company at the intersection of science and spirituality, is a world-renowned pioneer in integrative medicine and personal transformation. Chopra is a Clinical Professor of Family Medicine and Public Health at the University of California, San Diego, and serves as a senior scientist with Gallup Organization. He is the author of over 90 books translated into over forty-three languages, including numerous New York Times bestsellers. His 91st book, Total Meditation: Practices in Living the Awakened Life explores and reinterprets the physical, mental, emotional, relational, and spiritual benefits that the practice of meditation can bring. Chopra has been at the forefront of the meditation revolution for the last thirty years. His latest book, Quantum Body co-authored with physicist Jack Tuszynski, Ph.D., and endocrinologist Brian Fertig, M.D. TIME magazine has described Dr. Chopra as “one of the top 100 heroes and icons of the century.” www.deepakchopra.com