Being in the Present Moment

23 Jan Being in the Present Moment

Can you imagine how great you’d feel if you could stay calm and mentally clear in the midst of whatever is happening in your life.

Think about how much physical, emotional, and mental energy you could spare, if you could stop questioning all the aspects of your life, continually trying to control life events and all the people around you.

Imagine how free and calm you would feel, if you could stop being thrown off by those around you.

As humans, the natural processing of our brain is to race from one thought to another, and many times those thoughts balloon and branch off into more thoughts and ideas…and I bet if you really looked many of these thoughts are NOT focused on the present moment. We’re commonly either in the past or future, rarely in the present.

But most of us still spend a lot of our days lost in memories… maybe re-living a sunny vacation or maybe more likely…repeating an old conflict or negative situation over and over in our heads.

Or often times we get lost in scenarios of what could or should happen in the future. Maybe through daydreams, overthinking or having a game plan for every possible outcome of these scenarios.

Sometimes our thoughts become split and unfocused, flip flopping between several different events, tasks and even people.

But please understand, moving into true present moment, has a very distinct feel to it. It’s almost like slow motion or being in the zone, laser focused on the moment that you are in. You become so sucked into the present that the past and the future become hard to even bring into your thoughts.

The present moment is the one time and place where you can be and still have any sense of control over.

For most people, happiness and even a sense of inner peace seems fleeting and temporary, it’s fleeting because external circumstances affect it.  As the mind becomes more peaceful, it becomes easier to see choices and options that may have not been visible before.

Here are a few techniques to experience being in the present moment;

You can practice using a stop-word or phrase to quickly disrupt and stop the inner conversation or looping train of thoughts.

If I notice that my thoughts have drifted away and maybe starting to loop, I use the word… No, no & no (multiple times seems to stop me in my tracks).

Then a quick follow up by focusing on your breathing, take 3 deep breaths in and out.

Try to focus on what is happening right around you, right after you center yourself with your breath
try and use all your senses for a minute or two… notice the sensations you feel in your body…stay there noticing your body sensations for a few more minutes…this will draw you back into the present moment. One of the most powerful tools is to feed your five senses.

Whether you realize it or not, you are already equipped with the most powerful tools at hand, your senses, they are some of the best tools we have to bring us back to the moment. When I find my mind wandering into the future or past, I use my five senses to bring me back to the present. I stop my thoughts and bring my focus to my body. I ask myself: What do you hear? Taste? Feel? See? Smell? Doing this simple inquiry takes me away from any kind of thoughts and brings me back to what’s happening right in this moment, this now.

Another effective technique to try;

Single-tasking it’s a hot topic for work flow teams, its used to achieve efficiency at any task. But this is a technique that can be used for all tasks of your day, we have become a society of multi-taskers new studies show that when we focus on a single task, our minds can fully be engaged in the task, we can then tap into laser focus and the clarity that accompanies a focused action.

Get a good start to your day and set the tone for it by doing one thing at a time as soon as you wake up. Even if it’s just for a few minutes and even if you have to get kids ready to leave the house.

How about engaging with one thing at a time while online, or try not using any electronics during a conversation. These are habits we have slowly gotten use to, doing many things at the same time. We feel more efficient and like we are completing our “to do” list, when in truth it dilutes every task we are involved in…Take it slow, try one small step a day and before you know it you will have broken one of the most blind habits we all do unconscious action.