Not fretting about the future.
Not regretting the past.
Not wondering or worrying about tomorrow or next week or whether or not everyone around the Thanksgiving table will be speaking kind or kind of not speaking.
Simply here. Present. In this moment, this day, this grace.
When you can kind of be that? Your world can kind of change.
Jesus said it too, right?
“Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” (Matthew 6:34)
But, well, yeah. Easy for Him to say, right?
No disrespect intended but…well…He’s God. Divine. Omnipresent and omniscient and omni-that-other thing. Oh yeah, omnipotent.
All powerful.
Me? And you? Not so much.
No power to change the past. No power to really change the future, though I’ll grant you that hard work and planning and being true to who you are is never a bad idea. Also, I believe that the future can be tweaked just a bit for the better by passing up that second donut. Or the first.
But the present? Now that’s another story.“We have to get back to the beauty of just being alive in this present moment. (~Mary McDonnell)
Sort of.
Sort of, because maybe I can’t change the present moment at all, not one whit. And maybe what’s in my present is not so much a present that I want to open as one that I was forced to take.
Maybe I don’t even want to be in this present, is what I’m saying.
But then again, if the present is all I really have (and it really is, when you think about it), then when in the world do I get to live at all if not in this moment?
Simply this moment.
Simply here.
Not worrying and not wondering and not even regretting yesterday’s donuts.
But being and seeing and noticing the now and simply breathing in the reality that is the only reality – the present moment and all that it presents.
It can make so many things better, you know.
For example, my present moment at times includes violin practice. Which sometimes includes a few less than perfect sounds. Okay, truth-be-told, sometimes the sounds are simply horrible. The kind that might make the cat dash from the room, and in fact used to do just that thing when he was still with us. Now, they just make me get the worst tickle in my throat you’ve ever seen.
But here’s the thing – I don’t push past them and rush by them. I notice them.“Always say ‘yes’ to the present moment…Surrender to what is. Say ‘yes’ to life – and see how life starts suddenly to start working for you rather than against you.” (~Eckhart Tolle)
I know, weird.
And yet, the only way to fix them is to notice them. Really be present in the moment and notice it.
Simply be there.
And yes, I know that most of life is not that simple. But then again, sometimes it is.
Sometimes simply listening to the other – being simply there and hearing and not just thinking of the next thing you’re going to say or that thing that happened earlier which is way more interesting than what this person in front of you is saying – can help you notice things. Things that need noticing. Hearts and words that need noticing.
If you’re really there.
Look, even before technology pushed its way into our lives 24/7 we humans weren’t all that good about being present. We can’t just blame this all on tech. (Though it might be a good idea to put that phone down now and then.)
This is something that people have struggled with for the longest. I mean, if Jesus mentioned it you can pretty much assume that it’s a universal.
And I think you can also assume that His advice just might be the best advice there is.
“Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” (Matthew 6:34)
Simply be here. Today.
Not fretting about the future.
Not regretting the past.
Not wondering or worrying about tomorrow or next week or whether or not everyone around the Thanksgiving table will be speaking kind or kind of not speaking.
Simply be here.
Simply here.
Present.
Noticing this moment. This day. This grace.
It could change a life.
~xo,
LuAnne
