All you have is NOW? Nope. 🚫

Today I’m taking issue with a fashionable platitude that I often hear.  It’s born of shallow, quasi-mystical Eastern philosophy and I’m sick of it!

“All you have is NOW 🧘”

Blech 😝

Okay, sorry if I’m slaying one of your sacred cows… 🐄

And if you like it, by all means keep it.

But let me tell you why I DON’T like it.

I don’t like it because it’s not true.

You don’t just have the now.  You also have the previously now and the subsequently now.

We usually call these the “past” and “future”.  And we often call now the “present”.

Now means a particular moment - the moment that exists right on the razor’s edge of time.  Weird, isn’t it?  We all know what it means, but contemplating it and fixing your gaze upon it almost automatically induces a highly potent state of subjective mysticism and mysteriously mesmerizing metaphysical speculation.  We look at the present moment and wonder “what is time made of?”  “How does it work?”  “Why do we keep getting more of it?” “What is my life?”  “What is anyone’s life”?

And when people say “now is all we have” this is the state that they’re attempting to induce.  Because what they’re really trying to get you to do is to step out of your anxieties, worries, and burdens and retreat to that expansive and seemingly-timeless place contained in the pure present moment.

But it isn’t timeless.  Not really.  Because the moment you just spent in contemplation is now in the past, replaced by another that was previously in the future.  In a sense they all meet in the present.  But in another sense, a very real sense, they exist aside from the present.

And if we start there we quickly realize that almost none of our lives at all exist in the present.  Because, with the highly exclusive exception of the current present moment, 100% of our lives have existed and will exist in the past and future respectively.  Further, a full 100% of the lives of all those who have passed were lived in the past, and a full 100% of the lives of those not yet born will be lived in the future.  Therefore, in what is essentially a direct contradiction to the original assertion, the present moment is actually almost none of what we have.

So no, I don’t agree that the present is all we have.  I understand the motivation behind saying so, but it’s simplistic and excludes processes that are crucial for our growth, success, and sense of meaning.

⏱️ Yes, we have the present.  That’s where all the peace is.  In that seemingly timeless space on the razor’s edge of reality as we seek stillness.

⏱️ But we also have the past.  That’s where all the stories are, full of the pain and triumphs that we carry with us and convey to one another as we seek connection and compassion.

⏱️ And we have the future.  That’s where all the visions are, full of excitement and anticipation for the stories not yet written, around which we rally and energize our collaborators.

Like so very much in our lives, it’s all in how we think about it.  Given the three statements above, it is sometimes right to live in the past, the present, or the future, and given the dynamic and complex shape of human existence, all are variously necessary and helpful for different aims.

Want to heal?  Seek the past.

Want to rest?  Seek the present.

Want to grow?  Seek the future.

We have all of these in abundance for our great benefit, and also that of those we love, serve, and lead.