The Present Moment

Focusing on the present moment is calming in itself, but that's just the tip of the iceberg. The big advantage of the here and now is that this is where everything actually happens—the good AND the bad. Depending on whether it conforms to our expectations our behavior is either aligned to this reality or disconnected from it. Insight is knowing the difference.

Transcript

Hello everybody and welcome to Mindfulness Live.

This week we're talking about the present moment.

And,

Well,

The present moment is the most obvious thing there is.

Like everything is here.

It's where you are.

It's obvious and yet when we try and focus on it,

It's hard.

So what's going on?

And there's this idea that by focusing,

And we talked about this on Wednesday,

That by focusing on your breath that somehow that will magically transport you to a state of peace.

And of course it can be peaceful to just watch your breath,

But it's not just peace and quiet that's in there.

There's crap in there as well in the present moment.

And that's really what we're looking for.

That's really,

We want to look at all the stuff that's getting in the way and where it comes from.

So make yourselves comfortable and here you are.

You don't even have to take a deep breath.

In a sense you're already there.

Because it's not about the breath,

It's about your attention.

And keep your attention inside,

On the breath.

And the movement in your body and the sensations in your body.

And what's going on?

What's actually happening now is this.

Your body is passing along to you the information that it collects each moment,

Showing you sights and sounds and smells and tastes and touches.

Sense of touch inside your body as well,

Not just outside.

This is what's going on.

And that's not all.

You connect to those sense impressions by knowing them and naming them sometimes,

Usually.

So as you watch the breath,

Be aware of the mind engaging with it.

And it starts not in your head,

In your heart,

Or actually in your brain still.

It's a feeling.

And right now that feeling may be of peace and clarity.

But even if it's not,

Even if it's confusion,

This is what's going on.

This is your life.

This is your business.

No one else is going to take care of it.

So in this moment is the breath and you minding your breath.

Minding what's going on in the present moment with the breath at the center.

But that's not all.

All these sense impressions,

All these feelings,

All this ongoing mental activity.

That's what's going on right now.

That's what it means to be alive and conscious and human.

Sometimes clear,

Sometimes confused,

But always within reach.

You can always stop and know yourself.

Just by watching the breath feeling your senses,

Knowing your mind.

And now taking three more breaths,

Open your eyes.

So when we talk about mindfulness meditation,

Which starts with the breath,

It's a very simple way of saying,

What we're doing is we're sort of corralling the mind.

In other words,

It's like the way that ranchers will corral the horses into a pen.

So we're trying to take our mind and sort of not squeeze it,

But just gently guide it into something which is manageable.

So that I have time to feel that stress in my stomach or that twitch in my eye,

Whatever's going on.

Most of the time,

All this unconscious stuff is happening.

Most of my life is on automatic because I'm focusing on something very distant,

Like,

Well,

We're doing this marketing plan now in which we hope to make sales over Christmas,

Which will produce and so it's so far away from where I am in this moment,

This real moment,

That I don't even have time to pay attention to it.

And all of that is on automatic.

So that's necessary when we're planning,

Especially when we're planning far ahead or trying to be creative or reaching back deeply in the past to understand what happened.

We need all these things.

These are part of what make us human.

But we also need to be able to come into this present moment.

And one of the ways in which we can do this is by,

Let's call it mono tasking,

Which is not really the point.

The point is to see when we're trying to multitask,

And that's what we want to recognise.

We want to get out of that habit,

Really.

It's not very productive.

The research is pretty definitive on that.

It basically takes two tasks,

Mix them together,

And each of them therefore take longer.

And the sum of the two takes longer.

And also probably not quite as well done.

But I find sometimes that I want to focus on one subject,

But the other one still seems so important that it feels wrong to let it go.

So it's sort of in the back of my mind,

I know I'm going to deal with it later.

But I still sort of hang on to it.

And that impacts the thing I'm doing,

Or trying to do in the front of my mind.

So it's,

It can be counterintuitive to come back.

Not about coming back,

It's about seeing that I'm doing both of these things.

As soon as I see it,

Automatically I come back,

I let go of it,

Oh yeah,

I'm hanging on to that,

It's getting in my way.

So it has to become fully conscious.

And this is a path,

If you like,

Of monotasking.

Think of that word through the day,

Just let it,

Let it appear in your eye,

You know,

In your mind's eye,

Monotasking,

Oh yeah,

Let's keep things simple.

Stay in the present moment a bit more.

Don't worry,

You're not going to get stuck in the present moment forever.

That's not going to happen.

But you do need to be there a little bit,

Right?

So breathing exercises,

Meditation,

As we know,

Can bring you into the present moment.

But all of these things are not,

Well,

It depends on you.

I was going to say they're not designed just to quiet your mind.

But if that's why you're doing it,

Then that's what you're going to get from it.

It depends on your motivation as well.

If you're looking to quiet your mind,

That's a very different thing from if you're getting,

If you're trying to know your mind.

Obviously,

Knowing is much more complicated.

And it's much more,

You have to deal with your expectations and your judgments and your denials and your wishful thinking and your biases and your defense mechanisms and all of these things play,

You know.

When you're,

When you're live,

These things play all the time in our minds.

But if you take the focus that okay,

I'm going to sit down,

I'm going to watch my breath,

I'm going to become calm,

Then whatever calm you get,

You'll rejoice in and whatever calm you don't get those other moments,

You're basically going to say,

Oh,

No,

That's not calm.

Instead of saying,

Oh,

That's denial.

Oh,

That's bias.

Ah,

That's my expectation.

You're losing all that clarity by focusing on the peace.

And the reality is that in both cases,

You're probably going to get the same amount of peace.

But when you're meditating for peace,

When this present moment is only about that,

And that's all that you'll see in it.

Self-evident,

Right?

Not a complicated piece of logic,

But hard to tie your mind to.

And that's what we're trying to do.

So we practice,

Practice what makes it sinking.

Another word for attention is noticing.

We notice what's going on.

And noticing happens consciously and it happens subconsciously.

Things attract our attention,

Sometimes out of the corner of our eye,

A movement or an idea that we hear a snatch of conversation.

Knowing what is attracting us and pulling us from the present moment.

Again,

That's what we want.

We don't just want to hear nice,

Peaceful sounds.

We want to hear everything.

The goal is peace.

The long-term goal is peace.

But in the present moment,

What we discover is that the source of disquiet,

Non-peace,

If you like,

Most of that comes from in here.

You know,

Let's say I hear a leaf blower out in the street.

Okay,

While I'm trying to meditate,

And I have damn leaf blowers.

I'm going to blame the leaf blower.

And I'm going to get upset.

Then I'm going to go through my little mental thing of all the bad things,

All the earthbound funguses that leaf blowers throw up into the air that cause all sorts of respiratory illnesses and the sound which is this unnerving constant drone which gets into your nervous system.

So what's upsetting me here?

Is it the leaf blower?

Or is it my thinking about it?

All those thoughts and biases I have about it.

We realize that much of this is within,

Well,

Let's say we are the ones doing it.

To say it's within our control sounds,

Sounds like a big claim.

But the fact that I'm doing it does tell me that maybe I can do it a little less.

Maybe I can take it less seriously.

Maybe I can give myself a bit of a break.

And that's what the present moment is for.

In the present moment,

Change is possible.

That's the only time it's possible.

We have to catch ourselves in the act,

See the way that we allow ourselves to drift into automatic and take back the reins and say,

No,

Wait a minute,

I'm going to do it differently.

I'm not going to just sit here waiting to be peaceful.

I'm going to use this time to understand my mind.

Because there's only one moment in which you can understand yourself,

Your mind,

Your existence.

And in that moment,

It's also a miracle.

Once all those biases and expectations,

Once all that clutter and all those,

All that baggage is gone,

Then what you're left with is this miraculous experience of being sensory and being emotional and being mental.

And you're at the center of all this experience and it's wild.

It's like a riot at the funfair.

It's incredible.

You never know what's going to happen,

What you're going to see or hear.

We're surrounded by beauty and misery,

Joy and fear,

Happiness,

Depression.

This is life.

It's the whole gamut.

It all happens in the present moment.

And if you want to experience it all,

Then this is where you have to be.

But you're not going to experience it all.

You also need to take care of that other stuff out there.

You need to make your plans.

You need to understand your past.

You need to see,

Especially you need to be able to track consequences.

I behave like this.

That happens.

That's why I always get stuck in a corner.

Every time I engage with that person in that fight,

I end up in the same state of self-doubt.

Why is that?

You know,

When you actually bring it to your conscious mind and think about it,

It's usually very obvious.

But the thing is,

We don't.

We just let the same old patterns play out again and again and again.

Why are we afraid to question them?

Because they seem out of control.

And so we come back to the present moment and we discover that they are within control.

We can change.

In fact,

We can't change anywhere else or at any other time except right here and now.

The present moment.

Okay.

Take a nice breath.

Take another.

And another.

And get used to the fact that you're always in the present.

It's always right here.

Never distant,

Never hidden.

And right now we tie it to the breath.

And the breath comes and goes.

The moments come and go.

You know the passage of time.

You sense it.

Yet it's hard to put your finger on.

Is it this moment?

Or is it that moment that just passed?

It doesn't stop.

It's always changing.

Not only can you only change in the present moment.

You always change in the present moment.

Everything that you experience,

Everything you are,

Everything you know,

It's in motion.

Changing in ways we can hardly even grasp.

And somehow it all makes sense.

It all changes together in ways that we can follow.

But we can also bring our own intelligence,

Sensitivity,

Awareness.

We can guide that change,

Channel it,

Direct it,

Learn from it.

And so in this way we stay with the breath.

And you feel your body.

Feel first of all the skin,

The container that holds everything in,

Filled with nerve endings.

And inside the skin,

All the solids,

The bones,

Cartilage,

And all the connective tissue,

Fibres.

And then the soft organs,

All packed together,

Enabling you to sit upright,

To move.

And to do the fine human things such as speaking,

And typing,

Writing.

This is your body.

A human,

Intelligent,

Sensitive,

Thoughtful,

Healthy with mind.

A body-mind with an identity,

You.

Somehow you're at the centre of this incredible experience,

Being alive and conscious and aware.

You know it's temporary.

The moments pass,

Time moves.

And this is the miracle that in this moment,

Right now,

Here you are,

Ever so Swe- And the breath comes and goes.

And you too come and go,

Changing from moment to moment,

Seeming,

Seeming the same,

But always changing perceptions,

Moods,

Your thoughts,

Preoccupations.

And every now and then you come back here,

The breath,

To the present moment.

Whether you're sitting in a silent room,

Driving your car,

Walking in a crowd,

Present moment is right there.

It's always within reach.

No matter what you're doing,

You simply have to enter it more with all your heart and mind,

Without distraction.

To do this for even a moment will change you,

Will change you in conscious ways.

And now taking three more breaths.

Open your eyes.

And you too come back here,

The breath,

To the present moment.