Moments lack permanence.
Today is unlike any other day, because it is uniquely always ‘now’; it is today. Yesterday is among so many other past days. They queue up in an orderly fashion, following rules of time and the passage of time; yesterday has become memory, lacking in substance. Tomorrow, too, is without substance, stretching infinitely ahead with the rest of future events, lacking even the ‘reality’ of memory, of having once been… Tomorrow is only a thought of things to come, and perhaps a bit of planning built on what isn’t yet happening at all, and may not, ever.
Really, we’ve only got ‘now’, ‘today’, to work with in any practical way. We can apologize for past events – there’s a lot of that going on, day-to-day, among well-meaning people. We can make promises or plans for the future – some of us crave more of that than others. Some of us see-saw between past hurts and a future more distant from those. Some of us balance delicately between past joys and a future that feels more uncertain. Perhaps we all do some of both?
I find it easy to look past today without intending to. The outcome is generally that I have less ability to affect my future willfully, and less perspective on a past I can’t change.
Today tends always to have the potential for action, for change, for the moment to bring will and choice together with a verb or two…neither yesterday nor tomorrow afford us that chance. I guess the puzzle is how best to learn from all those yesterdays, to plan a tomorrow in which I thrive – and to do so in a way that provides me an opportunity to take action today to bring me closer to where I most want to be…but to also do so without striving, or attachment.
Life’s lessons about attachment, specifically, are brutally difficult – at least for me, at least today. Oh, there are easy moments of clear vision and contentment, confident that the path ahead of me is paved, mapped, and free of obstacles. That, too, is an illusion. It is as illusory as the more difficult moments when it feels like I am wading knee deep in chaos and damage, in the darkness, with my eyes closed, banging my shins and stubbing my toes on a real life that is only to happy to keep moving the fucking furniture around or changing the rules.
This too will pass. Change, unavoidably, is. What will become of me? Whatever I make of me. And what of love? Well…love will attend to its own affairs if I attend skillfully to mine. Love, too, simply is. The challenge there is holding love’s flame within, trusting that the heart’s pilot light can’t really be blown out so easily. A friend recently wrote some beautiful words about love I am still finding relevant in this moment.
Today is a good day for perspective. Today is a good day to practice good practices, and good processes, and to trust incremental change over time. Today is a good day to take care of my heart with the same tenderness I would give to anyone else. Change is. Change always is – and it is always ‘today’. Today I’ll make the most of that.
Evening Light 