Last Updated on September 8, 2023
I find this little phrase – or dare I say mantra – very useful to jolt me into the present.
It has a curious way of bringing me quickly to awareness of my own mortality.
See that this—the immediate, everyday, and present experience—is IT, the entire and ultimate point for the existence of a universe.
This Is It
Here’s a little more Alan Watts while I’m at it:
We are living in a culture entirely hypnotized by the illusion of time, in which the so-called present moment is felt as nothing but an infinitesimal hairline between a causative past and an absorbingly important future. We have no present. Our consciousness is almost completely preoccupied with memory and expectation. We do not realize that there never was, is, nor will be any other experience than present experience. We are therefore out of touch with reality.
Alan Watts
I also like these quotes that can help jolt you into the present moment too.
Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans.” — John Lennon
“The trouble is, you think you have time.” — Buddha
“In the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you.” — Leo Tolstoy