In the Moment

 

In the Moment

by Craig Willms

 

All we have is now, live in the moment.

That's so easy to say, so easy to aspire to, so easy to declare as some kind of mystical truth. It's also completely meaningless - all the while being an absolute fact. Obviously, we live in the moment, literally constructing the past from our memory and the physical objects surrounding us, where the future is in fact our only destination. So, why even bring it up? The uneasy answer is that we should simply strive to live in the moment, whatever that means.

Living in the moment as a way of life is bullshit. We need to consider the past and plan for the future in our activities and actions. What we shouldn't do is blithely go through the motions, daydreaming our way through daily life. Being present and in the moment are good things, but not as a complete life strategy.

Now, we do seem to spend an awful lot of time living for the future instead of just living. That's just a fact of life, and what other way is there? Sacrificing the now for a more stable future is part of what makes us human. Regardless of what we do for a living we are always busy setting up our future selves. Even when we were hunter gatherers, we did things to prepare for our future. When we were agrarian, we literally lived every day with an eye toward the future harvest. How is our workaday world that much different? When we were young and just getting started, we'd work all day so that we could sit around drinking and watching TV that night before going to bed so that we can get up and do it all over again. We had to eat, and we had to pay the rent. Only the very rich can leisure all day and night, or work on projects of their own fancy. Not many of us are that rich.

In a perfect world we'd be doing just what we want and nothing more, that which makes us happy and fulfilled. The all-magical government would provide for all our needs so we could write books, paint pictures or sip cosmos with a little umbrella on the beach. Can I stop now? There is no magical government, it's a fantasy. In the real world we have to work so we can eat. 

The point here is that we all have to do what we needs to be done to make ends meet. That often means toiling away at boring, rote work that we can't wait to be over. The ideal is that we get to do work that we actually enjoy. This is why we try to educate and train ourselves for the possibility of a good and interesting job. However, that only goes so far, eventually we tire of everything that is required. Labors of love are few and far between. So, we work and plan and dream of the times to come when we can do what we want. 

I myself was a daydreamer in my early years. I'd pass the time planning or thinking about things I wanted to accomplish, big and small. At one time I was a field service rep and drove hundreds and hundreds of miles a day. It was the kind of job that didn't require brain power, just attention. It left a lot of capacity for deep thinking. The day was measured in endless miles, each and every thought was about was the future, I never lived in the moment. Years went by and I accomplished very little of the things I dreamt about. Later I trained in corporate network security and spent 25 years delving deep into the minutiae of network protocols and design. There was no time for daydreaming. Most of the time we lived in the moment, moment to moment, battling network outages or investigating security matters. In the moment yes, but not necessarily living. It was work that needed to be done and it may have kept me from the poor house, but was any of it really living?

You'd like to think there's a fine line between living and really living, but it's not fine, it's invisible. We live, we give 'the moment' the attention it deserves. There's nothing wrong with trying to be present, to be fully present in the now. It's probably even advisable. We shouldn't be worried when we're not. There's nothing wrong with being a dreamer, looking to a brighter day to come with joyous anticipation. There are days when we are just putting in the time, not enjoying the moment simply because the moment has so little to offer. The trick is to know when to pay attention and let life soak in.

When people say things like live in the moment, they generally mean to be present in your own life. They're saying don't worry about things you can't control, and they usually mean well. When we were kids our mom used to say "don't wish your life away" when we would complain about having to grow up before we could do certain things. She was telling us to enjoy the moment, because soon enough we'd be in the workaday world, and we'd pine for the fancy-free days of our youth. We, of course, let it in one ear and out the other. She was right, it was good advice, we know this now. Strive to live in the moment and live without regrets.