Live the present moment free of past & future

Sep 4, 2009, 12.00am IST
JANINA GOMES.


Living in the present is the only way to live. It is in the present moment that we touch base with our inner selves and come to terms with outside reality.


The now is a continuum from the irretrievable past to the embodied future. In life we are continually say goodbyes to our past situations and circumstances and our reactions to them. At the same time, in the now, we plan and perfect a future we would like to ensure for ourselves.

The now is present in all that we enjoy and each moment expands our inner consciousness. In the now we can be enveloped by sun, shine and rain. The dawn of a new day, each day, makes the morning a time of peace, thanksgiving and prayer, loaded with positive vibrations and thoughts.


As the day progresses, we go on to encounter both good and bad. We choose in each moment to strengthen the good in us and to weaken the low and unpalatable, so that the now acts as a bridge going from one good experience to another.

We wrap up the experiences of the day at evensong. Each moment of the 24-hour day is a renewed invitation to live in the now. When we choose to live our lives by dwelling in the past and with our attention riveted on a future that has not yet arrived, forgetting the present, we lose the precious now that is in the moment.

If we live in the now, we experience the richness of the present moment. We are rooted in reality and we extract from both the past and the impending future the ever present now. In the present, there is an ever present flow of existence. We learn to live from moment to moment. We flow along with life. In the now we make our divine encounter because God is all that is.

Nature knows no past or future, except in our human consciousness, but we relate to reality as if it were a finished event or an inevitable future.


If we remain in the now, we are open to enjoying all that is given to us as gift during the day. We experience to the full, joy and sadness, laughter and pain, dismay and hope, beauty and ugliness all wrapped up as gift in the present moment.


Though we all live in the present, some of us are more open to the nowness of everyday reality. Others try to flee from the present, because of unfinished work from the past or a hazy future, not built on outside reality.


That is why in the now we rise when we rise, we pray when we pray, we eat when we eat, we live as we live. In such an existence, the past is over, only memories remain and the future is still a way off because the future builds on present moments.


The now helps us to arrive at our destination in the most effective way possible. If we live in the now, we cannot help but touch the divine presence because God is Master of the moment.

Live now to the full, catch the early morning sunrise, enjoy the dew, eat a hearty breakfast, enjoy the work of the day, your leisure, spend enough time exercising, begin and finish the day with prayer. The now will never let you down, because you are responding to it from your own inner being, which gives pattern and harmony to the now.

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