The Art of Being Present
By R. Cody Smith   

I remember in grammar school, the teacher would call out our names and all us kids responded by saying "present," a classic oxymoron of course, since there is nobody less present than a first grader. While our bodies were ensconced in the miniature chairs, our minds were somewhere else, anywhere else but in that classroom.
        Comedian Woody Allen once said, "Ninety percent of life is just a matter of showing up. Certainly showing up is a good thing but the postmodern definition of being present means a lot more than simply occupying a space. 
        This contemporary idea of "being present" means being completely available and aware of real-time life events about us, living in the reality of this moment, and at it's best also conveys a sense of being available not only for ourselves but for others as well.
        Unfortunately this is not my natural state, instead it seems I am subconsciously avoiding it. When not engaged in some absorbing activity my mind automatically turns away from the present to dwell on thoughts of either the past or the future.

The Past:
Even though the past is over and cannot be changed, I still seem to spend an inordinate amount of time there. I rehash my mistakes, relive my regrets and recount all the injustices perpetrated on me, everything from a disappointing childhood experience to this morning's slight from my wife. 
        Occasionally an issue gets resolved, mostly because I finally decide it's no longer worth fretting about, actually it never was. At moments like these my mind flits right on through the very uncomfortable present and resumes it's other endless struggle. 

The Future:
If the past is unchangeable the future is so full of variables that it practically guarantees to provide a near constant state of anxiety. I worry about the future trying to anticipate the unknowable, maneuvering, strategizing for control. There is a fear, that if I stop obsessing over the future I might loose control and something bad could happen. It's as though my obsessing is some kind of power that holds the very stars aloft in the heavens. Believe me it's not. 

        In my more passive moods I find myself daydreaming, or simply killing time while waiting for something to happen. I waited to be sixteen so I could drive, twenty-one so I could drink and vote, then I waited for maturity so people would trust me in business. Right now I'm waiting to collect Social Security, and then I suppose I'll be waiting to die (finally, the end of waiting). 

        It is in the midst of all this distraction that I am expected to live. As John Lennon sang, "Life is what happens to you while you're busy making plans."

The Present:
Every once in a while I have a moment when past and future struggles cease and I actually find myself visiting the present. I spend so little time here that it makes me feel uncomfortable, and insecure; there is a sense of loss, the loss of the familiarity of my own compulsive self-talk. The absence of all this tension seems so strange that I am only able to endure it momentarily, and then quickly I plunge back into another time and resume the struggle.

        Safe from reality, moving between past and future I have carefully constructed my ego self. This is who I prefer to think I am, but in the present I might suddenly encounter who I really am, I seek it, yet I fear it, I don't know who I really am, and it frightens me. 

Surely I want to live life as the person that God made me to be, but who is that?

Conclusion:
Being present requires that I begin to trust God and let go of the uncertainties of the future and the injustices of the past in order that I can become fully engaged in the reality of the present moment. There is a freedom here, freedom from self; it is here in the present that I begin to think less and less about me, and more and more about others.  
        My need for intimacy with other human beings springs from my need for intimacy with God, both are satisfied only in the present. The present is also the habitat of the Holy Spirit making it the only place in time when where I can truly commune with God.
 
        Being present seems to fit nicely with the description of the ancient mystics as the meditative first step to communion with God. Extending this focus into the rest of my daily life could then result in a continual abiding in his presence (an inspiring thought).  

        God, living in the vast continuum of time, became flesh and made his dwelling among us. There was no guile in him, when you talked with him he hung on your every word. He wasn't preoccupied with himself, or with what he was going to say next. He was totally present for you in that moment. It gave you the sense that he came for you and you alone; This God-man who defines love, waits on us still.

His hope is that we will become more like him, living more presently, more available to him, and for others.

 
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