At any given time, when you’re walking down the road, a very small percentage of your brain is focused on the present. The rest is planning the future or regretting the past.
I have to admit to myself after reading this, that I spend a huge amount of time planning and daydreaming about the future. I play out imaginary conversations and scenarios all the time.
However, the problem with this type of future fantising is that it keeps you from seeing the beauty in everything and for being grateful for where you are.
The same is equally true about our pasts. A lot of unhappiness comes from comparing things from the past to the present.
We crave experiences that will make us present, but the cravings themselves take us from the present moment.
The anticipation for our vices pulls us into the future. Thus eliminating vices makes it easier to be present.
This is perhaps one of the reasons the happiest and most successful people I know rarely drink or take recreational drugs.
To say presence is required for happiness is an understatement. Happiness is built on presence. Without presence there is no happiness.
What if this life is the paradise we were promised, and we’re just squandering it?
Eoghan‘s Blog 