Living in the present

It is important to live in the present. If we think clearly, most of the time, we live either in the past or in future in our dreams. It is not me telling it, but Naval Ravikant, a great investor and Philosopher, mentioned during a conversation with Tim Ferries. I am just supporting the thought.

A similar incident happened with me. Recently, I was travelling to Nrishinghatola (a temple) from Kolkata alone by train to offer some puja, and had plan to return the same day. I had plenty of time as I started early in the morning, and dedicated the whole day for that visit. It was a cold Thursday morning in January and the temple and the surrounding was very quiet with around 10 people. I offered my puja and then walked towards a pond adjacent to the temple. The pond was surrounded by farming land,  with an empty boat docked at the land and there were two homeless people sitting quietly. Somewhere in distance, ‘Harekrishna’ chanting was playing, making the environment somewhat spiritual. It was so quiet that I wanted to spend several hours there without thinking about anything. At that time, I was living in the present, and had no thought about past and future in my mind. It was a perfect peaceful moment which I didn’t want to end.

After sometime, Tanaya, my wife, called and I was explaining her the circumstances. I forgot that I had to catch the return train. During the conversation, she said that there is a train in 40 minutes and the next one is after 2 hours. As soon as,  the thought of returning back came to my mind, I started moving immediately. The thought of catching train disrupted my peaceful moment and I rushed to catch the train. The anxiety of missing the train ruined my present moment of peacefulness. I reached station in time and returned back to Kolkata by the evening.

I realized the importance of living in present through this incident. There are many instances in life when we unnecessarily disturb our present peace by thinking about past, which we cannot change, or future, which is always uncertain. We are living in a system where we need to think about our career, family, relationships, etc., so we cannot be like a monk, probably. But, sometimes it is important to live in the present, which is more certain, without worrying much about a lesser known future. As it is often said ‘Enjoy the journey and think less about the destination’.