Whether the glass is half full or half empty, the reality is the same – the future is now.
Paul Kalanithi, author of When Breath Becomes Air, wrote ” Most ambitions are either achieved or abandoned; either way, they belong to the past. The future, instead of the ladder toward the goals of life, flattens out into a perpetual present.”
Brother Phap Dung, a monk & senior disciple to Thich Nhat Hanh, said, “The future is built with the present moment . . . The future is not something that will come to us; the future is built by us, by how we speak and what we do in the present moment.”
Prior to Erie Marathon this past Sunday, I was reading the When Breath Becomes Air and meditating to keep my mind off the race and any pre-race jitters. Kalanithi’s words reminded me of our mortality and sparing future disappointment and Dung’s words to mean proactive starts with mindfulness of the present.
These words helped me finishing the marathon instead of quitting it.
Do you get bogged down by the past or the future?
Running with Buddha 