In the Now

Wednesday August 15, 2008

On the surface, being in the present moment sounds like something easy to do, the difficulty lies in keeping the mind, that ever present chatterbox, silent. When the mind is silent, life seems peaceful, it flows, time disappears and troubles seem to disappear. Everyone has moments when this happens without any effort on their part. When working on a project, that project became all there was in the world, the parts flowed together and presto it was completed. This is not to say there were no struggles, or challenges, or frustrations, only that in the end you feel amazement at how quickly it went. Yet, when you look at a clock you suddenly wonder where the time went. It seemed like only a few moments, yet hours on the clock passed.

During this time, you were in the present moment. Only that moment existed in your consciousness yet the clock ticked off several hours. This is how being in the now feels. Everyone has heard the phrase, time flies when you’re having fun. This is yet another example of being in the present moment.

Before you begin thinking time is going to pass you by if you live your life in the now, think again. Time passes us by when we are focused on the past or spend our time focused on some future event. These times are non productive, when nothing gets accomplished. We often become busy with things we cannot change.

The past is … well, passed. The future is likewise out of reach. We cannot change either in the present moment. We can only change what we choose to do now, and only affect the world as it presents itself to us. Since we cannot change the past and we cannot affect the future if we spend our energies there, wishing things were different, worrying about the future, the present moment is lost to us along with the ability to change our life in a meaningful way/

By putting the mind on mute, shutting down the incessant babbling that comes from there, we begin to see there are other choices that we can make. We can see life from a new perspective.

So how does one mute the mind? How does one shut down the babbling that constantly pours forth from our life long companion? We do it in very small steps. Start by taking a moment in time and simply emptying the mind. Believe it or not, you do control your own mind by your choices. You may choose to let it run at full speed criticizing everything you do, judging those around you, rushing you to appointments, berating you for your past failures, and bombarding you with the possibilities of failure in the future, or you may choose to have it be quiet for a short time.

My suggestion is to set an alarm for 5 minutes. (For me a quiet alarm is best because a loud one would startle me when it went off) Sit with both feet on the floor, feet and legs are not crossed, hands on your legs with the palms facing upward. Focus your sight on a spot on the wall across from you and let your mind be empty. Keep your eyes open and keep looking at the spot, don’t think about it just look. This does not mean to continually say to yourself “empty mind”, or “empty” or “quiet” or anything else, the goal is to have nothing going through the mind, having it be completely empty. When the eyes become dry it is okay to blink, just maintain your eyesight on that spot. Any sound you hear will simply be sound and unless it signals an emergency, should be allowed to pass without thought, comment or action.

At first the thoughts may continue to enter your mind no matter what you do. This is perfectly normal. Realize that over however many years you have been alive your mind has been talking to you at a rate that is much faster than you could speak it. To quiet it will take effort and practice. When a thought occurs don’t fight it, don’t get frustrated simply let it go. Steer yourself back to an empty mind. The first few times you do this exercise, steering yourself back to an empty mind may be what most of the five minutes consists of.

As you practice you will become successful at shutting the mind down for short times. Longer times will become easier over time.

I invite your comments and will publish them here.
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