'Living in the present’ is advice often given when it comes to improving one’s life, yet it is a double-edged blade which has always both fascinated and confused me.
Undoubtedly: it is good advice to stay connected to reality, rather than continually responding to what has happened a long time ago, or to what you fear might happen in the future.
Work with what is at hand, for, indeed, any action occurs in the ungraspable moment of time which we like to call the present.
Yet, what has always confused me about ‘living in the present’ is that there is neither a past nor a future implied in this advice. But that excludes the possibility of learning from what has happened as well as the pursuit of big dreams and life goals. Without the past and a vision towards the future, improvement is not possible.
My take on the issue has always been that people who advize you to ‘live in the present’ don’t necessarily mean by that you have to forget about the past or the future, but rather to stay connected with reality and give both past and future their appropriate places in it.
As if to say: ‘the present is writing the future with ink of the past.’
(See Waterval van het Heden for a similar take on 'living in the present' — in Dutch)
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