Living in the present

LIVING IN THE PRESENT

Written by

Brij Sachdeva

You might have heard the following expressions, thousands of times.

• Live in the moment.
• Live in the present.
• Forget the past.
• Don't worry about the future.
• Vartmaan mein jio.

This absurd paranormal philosophical ideology, which is beyond the scope of normal scientific understanding, has always been used to create confusion in the minds of people who can not comprehend the meaning and the implications of these fantastic explanations about those aspects of life, which can never be explained. By the time we think about the present, it changes into the past. Then how can we live in it?

In real-life situations, we cannot deny the significance of the past experiences and the dreams and desires that are associated with the future. Sometimes I wonder, what is wrong with learning from the past and applying it to our present and future to enhance the grace and the Vitality of life. The writer William Faulkner has said, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.”

If a tree has to grow higher into the sky, it has to grow its roots equally deeper into the earth. The past to humans is as the earth is to a tree. Similarly our intellect is like a tree. The tradition, the cultural heritage, and the history are the roots of our tree of intellect. Our past is the earth for these roots. Survival, growth and prosperity are the shoots that grow higher into society. If we have to survive, grow and prosper- we have to remember our past without any bitterness, learn the lessons from it and shape a future that is better for humanity. This is what we mean by civilisation.

Living in the present means that you are not going to bother about the past and the future. You are going to do whatever you feel like doing. If someone hurt you and you feel lIke killing that person, you are going to kill without giving any consideration to the inspirations of the past and the aspirations of the future, without giving even a single thought to the consequences of killing a person. Law is not going to spare you just because you practice living in the present. How can you kill a person without thinking about what will happen to your future?

If philosophy is used to express reality or it is used in the service of truth, righteousness and humanity, it is a genuine approach. But when it is deliberately used as a rhetoric to fascinate and influence people to induce surrender in them, it is nothing but exploitation of the gullibility of innocent people.