Breathing, Nexting, and Embracing the Moment
On being present
“Now what?” asked fox.
“I don’t know,” replied bear. “Perhaps we just wait and see what happens.”
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Where are you in this very moment?
When I was a kid, I was always thinking about what came next.
The next test…
The next soccer game…
The next time I had to speak to an adult…
Next was often synonymous with fear.
Even if I did next well – got an A, scored a goal, made it through a conversation with an adult – I was already dreading the next next.
All that nexting meant I spent a lot of time worrying about something that hadn’t actually happened or perseverating about something that already had.
All that nexting also meant I was trying to control what was based on what I feared it would be.
Pre-shaping future moments and reshaping past ones is a risky business.
And my little kid body soaked up all that feeling, making being present to the present uncomfortable for many years.
But I’m learning.
Because moments are beautiful. And wild. And deserving.
Quiet, loud, soft, and painful.
Spacious, tight, jagged, and joyous.
Breathing in, I am aware of this moment.
Breathing out, I embrace the feeling of this moment.
This moment.
Breathing in, I am aware of this moment.
The only moment.
Sacred, loving, true.
Breathing out, I am grateful for this moment.
This morning, I was unconsciously stringing moments together into a cold, sludgy pre-dawn line of not-positive thinking.
Then, thanks to generosity of a friend for sharing the Plum Village App with me, its meditation bell dinged in - as it does every 30 minutes to remind me to return to the present moment from wherever else I may be.
It broke me from my past-future slop and I looked up, just in time to see a purpleorange sunrise lighting the sky on fire.
What a moment, what a moment.
So, again, where do you find yourself in this moment?