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A spiritual comment and prayer to start the day with Steve Taylor

A few years ago I visited the British Museum in London, and saw a group of tourists filming the exhibits with mobile phones. They weren’t actually looking at the ancient relics, just filming them. As I watched the tourists, it struck me that none of them were actually there. Rather than looking at these relics now, they were preparing to look at them in the future, when they get back home. In fact, they weren’t visiting the museum now, they were visiting it in the future.

Human beings are probably the most inappropriately named species on our planet. Most humans spend very little time being. It might be more accurate to call ourselves human doings or human thinkings, since that’s how we spend most of our time. Many of us find it difficult to be – that is, to simply live in the present moment, aware of ourselves and our surroundings. We like to keep ourselves busy with activities and entertainments. We like to rush forward into the future, pushing the present away, as if it’s an obstacle.

However, it’s important to remember that life only takes place in the present. The past doesn’t exist anymore, and the future is yet to exist. The past only exists in our memory, and the future only exists in anticipation. If we’re not present to our experience, then in a sense we’re missing out on life.
So today, let’s focus on the present. From time to time, release your attention from activities and distractions, and bring yourself back to now. Look around you attentively, surveying your surroundings, the people and the objects and natural phenomena around you. Be conscious of your feelings and sensations, the experiences you are having right now, in your body and in the world.

Let’s savour the present, since it’s all we have.

Blessings.