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The past is irreversible, the future is unpredictable, the passage of time causes stress – and how can one learn to live joyfully “here and now”? And yet our correspondent decided to try. Here is her diary.
I’m uncomfortable. It’s very uncomfortable “here and now”, in my own life: the political climate is difficult, the economic crisis is on the next round, the state of the environment is frightening, there is again a new teacher in the kindergarten, which you need to get used to. It seems that we are constantly walking on the edge … How can you enjoy the current moment?
To be honest, I am able to “be in the present” only a couple of times a day, for example, in the morning, when the children are already in class, the coffee is brewed, and I have not yet updated the news feed. I love these ten minutes when you can just sit in the corner of the sofa … And let the shelves of bookstores burst with publications calling for “living better here and now.” I pass by because I sincerely do not understand how to live with what I have today, now, and at the same time not be choked with anxiety. Why is it so difficult for me to be in the present, in the only reality given to man?
One of the reasons is purely physiological: the brain is simply not adapted to this. “We don’t have a special organ to perceive a given moment in time, unlike, for example, taste or smell,” says neuroscientist Pierre Buser.1. To understand the passage of time, we look at the clock, which actually shows just numbers. We, on the other hand, perceive time in a completely different way: an hour in the dental chair seems like an eternity, and a week on vacation seems like an instant.
Moreover, we tend to expand the present, unwittingly coloring it with what has just happened and what is about to happen, just as we connect individual notes into chords and melody. There is a feeling that the present is slipping away from us, not given into our hands, and while we say that we should enjoy it (and, of course, post a picture on Facebook), it has already passed irrevocably …
Fourth dimension
The expression “here and now” is a tracing-paper with “hic et nunc”. The Latin version was used not philosophically, but quite utilitarian: to indicate that something (for example, payment of a debt or capitulation) should happen immediately, on the spot. If we talk about our life, then it involuntarily happens “here and now” (if we don’t have a clone or a time machine yet). At the same time, we rarely manage to truly realize and feel ourselves living in this moment: this feeling is a privilege of childhood. “There is no past and future in the picture of the world of five-six-year-old children, which is why they are so direct, spontaneous and free,” explains Gestalt therapist Maria Andreeva. “Growing up, they begin to build cause-and-effect relationships. Gradually, responsibility appears, as well as restrictions and requirements in relation to oneself.
In the evening, the child talks about what happened during the day, then he realizes that he needs to prepare for tomorrow’s performance in kindergarten today … So adult life gradually enters the nursery. But adults have a chance to re-experience the feeling of freedom, carelessness, timeless fullness of being: in moments of happiness, carried away by the game or even just looking at the sea or at the fire.
The usual burden of an adult is to keep in mind plans for the day, for the week, for the month, to analyze past mistakes and prepare future achievements, to learn from experience and anticipate difficulties … “For an adult, thinking only about the present would be irresponsible, infantile, childish”, Maria Andreeva says It is not for nothing that we do not approve of those who live for today – they lack scale, perspective, purpose.
Then I ask the Gestalt therapist the main question – what does the longed-for “live in the present” mean for me, a 38-year-old woman, mother of two children? And I get a simple answer: “Emotionally and consciously live what is happening to you. To be accessible to your own emotions, not to brush aside grief, not to put off unpleasant feelings “for later” and not to forbid yourself to rejoice. Live with what is, every moment … “
“Be in shape and listen to yourself”
Katya Kholopova, 39, Corporate PR Director of Estée Lauder in Russia and the CIS
I tried different sports and realized that as a physical activity, which, I am sure, is necessary for all residents of large cities, strength training is most suitable for me – powerlifting. I have been exercising three times a week for 14 years. What does it give me? I stopped leading a lifestyle where mobility was combined only with stress. Which did not lead to anything good: it is necessary just the opposite – in stress, control your reactions, and in ordinary life not turn into a jelly. And although I am still a very restless worker, now I am constructively restless: I know how to cope with various kinds of loads, super tasks – methodically, without doing everything at once. In three approaches, as in sports.
My “today” does not exist separately from the past and the future, it is organically woven throughout life. In order to be in time for everything, you need to be in shape, without the feeling familiar to many: “Everything will be twisted, shrunken, and now it’s scratching for work …” Three times a week I have to think only about my bodily sensations – which muscle should work and work now. It teaches me to control my body, to be hardy, disciplined, to listen to myself more. I make sure that the muscles are in good shape, so that they tense up a little more than they (me) are comfortable with. And I don’t need to limit myself to what I like today for the sake of mythical future prospects.
Presence practice
Yep, I understand what you’re talking about. American psychologist Ellen Langer generally believes that attention, awareness is what we lack the most to feel alive. If we look around with an open, attentive, unprejudiced eye, we can see the world “as for the first time”; if we make an effort to look, we will notice new shades, smells and sounds, small changes, possibilities that have arisen. Automatisms, on the contrary, disconnect our consciousness from reality: we drive a car to the country house, peel potatoes, or walk along a familiar street “on autopilot”, while thinking about something else.
“Here and now is one of the principles of psychotherapy, which allows you to organize a person’s attention in such a way that he focuses on what is happening at the moment, distracted from reflections, memories of the past or future,” explains existential psychotherapist Svetlana Krivtsova. – Blessed Augustine introduced the concept of “real present”: this is a state of mind in which it is completely focused on what is happening. Attention is therefore extremely important for the knowledge of the essence.2.
Eastern sages have long noticed: it is not what we do that matters, but how we do it. In the book of the psychotherapist Abby Seishes “In Search of the Secret River” I read: “There are two ways to wash dishes. The first is to wash the dishes to keep them clean, and the second is to wash the dishes to wash the dishes. If, to the sound of the water, we think only about the cup of tea that awaits us ahead, and try to finish the dishes as quickly as possible, we do not live – we are not able to realize the miracle that is our life.3.
When something good comes in life, you need to experience it in its entirety, so that later it would not be scary to let go
Personally, I trust the dishwasher to wash dishes, but otherwise I agree that it is difficult not only for me, but also for many of my friends to notice and enjoy the current moment. When we meet, we go over the past (“But before…” or “If only then…”), thereby limiting our possibilities today. “Still, I should have gone to the architectural school,” my friend Sasha, an excellent translator, likes to repeat. “I would be a designer and be a hundred times happier.” “By playing the situation again and again, it’s as if we are restoring a favorable course of events, hoping deep down that something will change in the end,” explains psychoanalyst Katia Denard.
The unconscious, Freud believed, is alien to the flow of time: unpleasant events are fresh and relevant even after many years, as if they happened to us only yesterday. “There is a point in experiencing (and chewing) the past if we try to learn from what happened, to figure out where and when we made a mistake, a wrong step,” emphasizes Maria Andreeva. “Thinking like this means we use the past as experience to help us navigate the present and look to the future.”
“Catch the day!”
“Carpe diem,” the call of the ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus (341-270 BC), is often interpreted as an invitation to revelry with plentiful meals, sexual excesses and the satisfaction of all desires. However, intelligent hedonism actually requires grit and diligence, as well as the ability to live in the present, in order to cope with the main anxiety: the fear of death.
In the famous Letter to Menekeyus, Epicurus explains that it is useless to worry about a hypothetical and unknown future over which we have no control. Anxiety about the future only spoils the present. Epicurus suggests adopting four rules of life: do not be afraid of the gods, do not be afraid of death, easily achieve good and conquer pain. This way of life, “so that the soul does not worry”, Epicurus called ataraxia – peace of mind.
Fly in the Ointment
Let us suppose that we have finally managed to take root in that one moment between the past and the future that really belongs to us. Alas, the enjoyment of happiness “here and now” awakens … guilt! In general, it is not very customary for us to be successful, contented, happy – as if there is something shameful in this, as if we are not worthy of it. And we also fear that all good things will end in the most terrible way. “Don’t get too excited, it won’t last long,” whispers a small voice and poisons any success and pleasure. We forbid ourselves to enjoy happiness in order to mitigate the suffering of its loss in the future.
“Any strong experience (joy, falling in love …) quickly passes, and rightly so, otherwise we would burn out like light bulbs,” explains Maria Andreeva. – What delighted us yesterday becomes familiar in a month. That is why, when something good comes in life, you need to experience it in its entirety, so that later it would not be scary to let go.
Realizing this, I decide to try… just to be happy. Parting with my husband in the morning, I no longer think that one of us will definitely be late because of a long goodbye, but I completely surrender to these sweet moments. And suddenly I understand that I was nervous and in a hurry not at all out of fear of the authorities. I was prevented by my own fear of becoming a little closer to another person, losing control, dissolving in another … To truly be here and now, in full awareness of what is happening, means taking a risk: that the past will return in one form or another with its grievances and failures, everything that has already happened once and did not lead to anything good will be repeated. For example, I already once wanted a very great intimacy … And today, in order not to get burned again, I always notice when my husband and I cross a certain line, and I immediately begin to get distracted, to remember things. That is, I arrange everything so as not to open up, not to reveal my feelings.
The experience of the “black stripe”
Sad news, a serious illness, the death of a loved one … We are ready to give everything, just to forget unpleasant events like a bad dream, suddenly find ourselves in a different place, in a different reality. However, even negative experiences play a positive role in our lives, reminds Gestalt therapist Maria Andreeva: “They need to be given as much respect and place as we give positive feelings: then they will do their job and go into the past, turning into experience. If we deliberately lose sensitivity so as not to experience pain, loss, sadness, devastation, anger, we seem to close our eyes, like in a movie, when a terrible episode begins on the screen. We just press the pause button. Sometimes a pause helps to survive – the pain is so strong that a person cannot “process” it.
We need to catch our breath, comprehend what we have already seen, and only then continue to watch our “movie”. After all, in any case, we have to watch it to the end. To survive pain, resentment, anger – to cry, to suffer one’s own, not being afraid of these feelings, not denying them. Only in this way can we integrate the “terrible” into our lives.”
The best thing is happening now?
Still, I want to learn how to regulate my relationship with the present. To notice your life not only when all feelings are aggravated: in new relationships, at a new job, on vacation … Appreciate the familiar, notice changes, perceive the world with an open mind. To notice yourself in the present, sometimes it is enough … just to open a magazine! As our reader Yulia Moricheva did.
Here is an excerpt from her letter: “Today, walking to work, I realized that the feeling of life “here and now” in all its fullness and versatility was given to me by your magazine. The best is not behind, not ahead, the best is here, already happening now! We live every moment, and for it to be beautiful, you need to understand who we are and why we are here.” And then we will feel: being present in our own life, we can actually stop the moment.
About it
Jon Kabat-Zinn “Wherever you go, you’re already there.” Meditation helps to realize the present and protect oneself from the influence of the past and the future. The book contains practical recommendations for self-study, intended for both beginners and advanced lovers of oriental practices (Klass, 2001).
1 P. Buser “Time, instant and duration. From philosophy to neurosciences” (Odile Jacob, 2011).
2 A. Augustine “Confession” (Azbuka, Azbuka-Atticus, 2011).
3 E. Seishez “In Search of the Secret River. Six Steps to Peace of Mind” (Speech, 2010).