Fall In Love With The Little Moments

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The moment is now. It’s a powerful time. If we open ourselves to the moment, our opportunities are endless. I wasn’t aware of this until it was almost too late. Thankfully, new moments always present themselves.

All my life until recently, my happiest moments were when I was looking forward to something. In fact, looking forward to an event was almost an addiction. I was never living in the moment; I was living in the moment before. I would look forward to going to the theater. I would look forward to a special dinner. I would look forward to a vacation. I would look forward to the kiss. It was always that time before the event that made me happiest.

The very next moment after, I would be asking myself if I was enjoying myself because I would be wondering if I was truly having a good time and then worrying about the fact that I wasn’t. Certainly not a very good way to live one’s life. Rather than looking to the future for a time when I might enjoy something that I wasn’t enjoying in the present, I should have been in the current moment enjoying everything it could have offered me.

Why did I wait for a birthday or another special occasion to celebrate? I should have appreciated things like the aroma of the pie baking in the oven and the sound of my children laughing. These were the many moments worth my attention. Why was I not enjoying every breath I took and every moment of my life when it was happening? Without my expectations for the future, I could have allowed myself to open up to what was unfolding in the moment and fully experienced my life.

I’ve learned that happiness is not a future event circled on the calendar. Happiness is a state of being, the peace and joy in the moment. And the current moment is all there is. Become mindful in the moment, not in some expectation for the future. The only time that is real is the current moment. When you’re mindful in the moment, you will be enjoying what is already around you and inside you. This is the opportunity you’ve been given to experience life to the fullest. I hope you will give this some thought and not wait as long as I did to live mindfully.

The present is the only time that’s real. The past is a memory. The future is an expectation.