January 05, 2007

Be Present to the Present

"What makes the minutes, days, and years of our life meaningful is not having more time or fewer activities. It is being attentive to 'now.' It is being present to the present.

Being present to the present is, itself, a spiritual practice of great magnitude. It is a practice that nudges us to awareness, alertness and attention. It is aided by a desire to live the human life as fully and significantly as possible. There are numerous distractions and diversions that threaten our resolve to be present to the present, but the promise of the practice is that we will avoid coming to the end of our lives feeling as though we've never lived at all.

The secret to the simplicity of time and being present to the present is re-discovering the value of time in our lives. Time is not the onerous taskmaster we imagine that demands our life's blood. Time is the great gift upon which the dreams of our hearts are given voice and expression.

Remember those experiences in life when you have "furiously lived out" the dreams emerging from your heart? Then time seemed as if it were standing completely still, or speeding joyfully onward at breakneck speed without our loss of control or awareness.

Simplicity of time awakens us to those hidden energies in the heart that are waiting to be birthed into action. The experience of being present to the present teaches us that time is not the enemy. Instead, we find that time is the great ally of the heart."

From a series of articles on developing a life of simplicity by The Rev. Canon Renée Miller

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