So, we're looking at the end of 2022. One day left. In reality, of course, it's not another year gone by, but just another day. Another single earth-sun orbit, in a never-ending stream of of such revolutions since the beginning of the planet.
The fictions we create around time have their uses - we measure our lives in days, weeks, months, years. One of the primary identifiers of people, among other things, is age. How old are you? What year were you born? What year did you graduate? How old is that leftover green bean casserole in the refrigerator?
We can agree to show up at 9:00 a.m., or 2:00 p.m., or 6:00 p.m., and we all know, by monitoring the clock, how to make that happen. Well, most of us, anyway!
But these existential fictions also snare our minds. We get lulled into beliefs and expectations about "the future". We plan for it, talk about it incessantly, like it's an actual existing thing. Like we have this much expanse of time ahead of us, whatever that may be. So often our attention and focus is on the future, or the past, neither of which exist now. And we miss our very lives as the present moment, the only place life can be lived, goes by unacknowledged.
We allow the scars, the conditioning, the trauma of a long-dead past to keep us emotionally and intellectually frozen, helping generate our fears and projections about "the future". We become clutched up about our goals, with trying to make things happen in the future, hoping once and for all to finally control our future - something no one in history has been able to do, but our egos need some sense of control, don't they?
And the present moment flutters by barely noticed, like a rare and beautiful butterfly that we don't even see. The treasure we have right in front of us is so often ignored, while we're busy anticipating a myriad of imaginary problems or disasters.
Yes, clearly we need to plan, for some of the contingencies in life we can plan for. Especially when others are depending on us. And setting some intentions for ourselves is a positive thing: This is how I would like to conduct myself. This is the kind of work I'd like to put out there. I want the highest good for everyone in this situation. And so on.
I won't be making resolutions for the upcoming year. Truthfully I don't know if I'll be alive by year's end. I'm going to keep my values, my ethics, and a positive intention or two in my travel bag and go from there. I want to see what's truly happening this moment. I want to truly see and hear the friend and loved one with me this moment, rather than the projected stories my ego-based noise voice is narrating nonstop. I want to see what's important to do - or sit with - in this moment, and let that awareness inform whatever action is taken.
If I can do that, I have a feeling "the future" will unfold with far less stress. And knowing that we can make another choice, or correct our course at any given moment, also takes the stress off. We don't have to know how it will all turn out to act in accordance with what we feel and know in our hearts.
