The Power of the Present Moment
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One way to achieve enlightenment is through completely merging with the Now. This is because God exists in the Now. In truth there is no such thing as time, but only one eternal Now. Time as you experience it, flows from the past to the present, and into the future. But if you think about it, both the past and the future happens in the Now. The past is nothing but a memory and the future is nothing but a fantasy. In other words it happens in your mind as a thought. But you are not your thoughts, you are the consciousness where thoughts come from, or the soul as religion calls it.
Nonetheless, time seems very real indeed. We see the effects of time in our own bodies as we grow older. We know time ‘happened’ because things change. Yet the notion that time is an absolute law of nature that we have no control over has already been smashed by science. Science has already told us that there is no such thing as absolute time when Einstein proposed the theory of relativity. Quantum physics also tells us that an event only occurs in space-time once there is an observer to observe it. Before that it was only a possibility.
The only theory that makes sense then is that time happens in consciousness or being, as the movement of thought. We created it to be able to experience the flow of events. But in pure being itself there is no such thing as time. It just is. It is that ground state of being where the entire universe originated. This ground state is pure consciousness. It is infinitely creative, dynamic and intelligent. It is what religion refers to as God. God can only be found by merging with this moment. But we humans find that very difficult to do because we identify with our minds or our ego.
We are always regretting things that happened in the past or fretting about the future. To experience pure being we need to move beyond the mind and the ego, which can be done through meditation. In meditation you can quite your mind and reach deeper levels of awareness where time and ego does not exist. It also helps to stop analyzing, judging, and interpreting things. These are all activities of the ego, and as long as you identify with the ego, there is no way you will be able to access the power of the present moment.
Another thing one can do is simply to be aware of the present moment as much as possible. As soon as you realize you are drifting off into the past or future, simply bring your attention back to the now. Take in as much as possible from this moment and just be present. We all make the mistake of thinking that in the future we will be happy, when all the happiness you need is in this moment. This is not some kind of myth. You don’t need to fulfill your desires in order to be happy. You can still go after your desires, but your happiness won’t depend on it. The happiness then becomes the process, not the outcome.
Being experientially alive in this very moment becomes the ultimate happiness. You don’t react to the unknown in predictable and conditioned ways. You are at one with this moment and the right response comes to you in every moment. This is to be in a state of freedom and enlightenment, but to get there is a process. It takes practice to be fully present, because we are so used to be the slaves of our minds and egos. But the quest to be fully present is the most important quest one can undertake in this life, because the reward is total freedom and power.
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