Personal Growth: Staying in the present moment April 23, 2019
Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Living in the Now.Tags: Eckhart Tolle, focussing, life, negative thinking, personal growth, philosophy, self-actualization, The Power of Now, the present moment, writing
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Most of us won’t admit it, but we often spend a large proportion of our mind-time on revisiting the past and particular in visiting the future by anticipating and visualizing how our life situation is likely to unfold; and in so looking, we tend not to foresee options but rather make assumptions on probabilities, often negatively.
In trying to be in two places at once, we miss opportunities in the most important third place…the present moment.
Eckhart Tolle sums up this paradox nicely in his book The Power of Now:
“To be identified with your mind is to be trapped in time; the compulsion to live almost exclusively through memory and anticipation…This creates an endless preoccupation with past and future.
The Now is the most precious thing there is. The eternal present is the space in which your whole life unfolds.
Life is now.”
Personal growth: Trying to recreate the past July 1, 2018
Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Living in the Now.Tags: creating our future, inspiration, life, personal development ideas, Personal growth and development, philosophy, psychology, recreating the past, self-actualization, writing
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One of the reasons why some of us tend to have trouble living in the Now, in day-tight compartments, is that we frequently spend a lot of energy in attempts to recreate our past, usually in a quest to re-enjoy an emotionally rewarding short- or long-term experience.
But are such efforts doomed to failure?
The short answer is, probably yes.
Sometimes we can have a strong flash of recollected emotion, which might have been triggered by hearing some music, smelling a particular aroma, or being in a place with lighting or atmosphere similar to that of an enjoyable past experience.
There are many more things that can trigger such emotional responses.
And the triggers are nearly always unplanned, unexpected.
And, these are brief emotional events that cannot be either artificially invoked or sustained.
Most of the time, particular emotionally rewarding situations are comprised of a unique combination of circumstances which very rarely, if ever, can be duplicated.
But we keep trying.
Better to fondly and appreciatively recollect our past experiences and the associated emotions, but to concentrate our actions and energy on the present and towards the future, creating new and rewarding experiences.
Unlike our futile efforts to recreate the past, we can create our future.
Dennis Mellersh
Personal Development Ideas 