Are you living where life is the most real and enjoyable?

The most powerful and valuable slice of life is the here and now.  It is this very moment.

The past is finished.  You cannot change it.  What’s done is done.  You should glean whatever lessons you can from your past, but otherwise let it be.

The future is an unknown quantity.  You can make choices to prepare for various eventualities, but in the end, you can’t control what happens next.

The only real option you have to live the best that life has to offer is to embrace the present moment for all it is worth.

How We Miss Out on Where Life Happens

Real life is happening all around you.  However, often it goes unnoticed.  We are too busy with so many other things.  While the present moment is passing us by:

• We bury ourselves in Facebook for hours on end.
• When we are at home, we are thinking about work.
• When we are at work, we are thinking about home.
• We become obsessed with meaningless agitations.
• We start feeling sorry for ourselves.
• We waste vast amounts of time “escaping” from reality.

What are you running from?  If you have problems, they won’t get any better until you face them.  Trying to avoid them only works for so long.  Eventually life catches up with you and you have to deal with it anyway so, why not just turn and face it now?

Once you’ve dealt with any outstanding issues, then you can really seize the moment.

How to Tune In to Where Life Happens

If you really want to drink deeply from all that life offers, then you’ve got to learn to fully absorb the moment you are in right now.  How do you do this?  Well, there are some techniques you can use to bring yourself back to reality.

If you can do just these three things, you’ll be well on your way to living where life happens:

1.  Become Hyper-Attentive

Your brain is so used to its current scattered way of thinking that it is necessary for you to retrain it.  You want to take steps to focus it like a laser on the present moment.  The best way to do this is to become hyper-attentive.  What do I mean by this?  Well, you start to really pay close attention to every single detail going on around you.  You notice the vividness of the colors, the pungentness of the aromas and the rawness of the emotions.  Of course, you’ve got to slow down to do this and you’ve got to be very intentional about it.  Glenn describes what hyper-attentiveness is like as he focuses on living in the moment.  Read his experience to learn more about how to practice this yourself.

2.  Take Time to Appreciate the Simple Pleasures

Typically, we are too distracted and worried to appreciate life’s simple pleasures.  We are in a rush to get to the next thing on our to-do list.  However, if you really want to experience where life happens, then you’ve got to start to gain a new level of recognition for these little moments that are truly priceless.  I’m talking about serendipitous little events that make life worth living.  If you aren’t sure what I mean, then see this list of simple pleasures for clarification.  You can’t manufacture these moments.  They have to occur naturally, but to get the most from life, you need to fully savor them when they appear.

3.  Stop All the Worrying

Corey puts this best when he admonishes us, “Don’t borrow trouble”.  When you hear of something bothersome and you start to worry that it could happen to you or your family, you are borrowing their trouble and making it your own.  This practice robs you of being able to enjoy the moment.  You become too wrapped up in worrying about what could be to see the enjoyable part of what is happening right this instant.  Focus on the positive and push the negative out of your consciousness.  If you are a worrywart, then this will take some practice before it becomes natural for you, but the effort is worth it.

Welcome Back to Real Living

You’ve been so used to living in the past or longing for the future, that being in the present will feel a little weird at first.  It will be somewhat foreign to you.  So, I want to welcome you back to living life where it really happens.  This is where you can find the most happiness and fulfillment.  This is where you can connect and love deeply.  This is where you want to be.  Practice the three techniques above and I’ll shout to you, “Welcome back!”

Have you been living where life happens?  What have you done to focus yourself on the present moment?  Share your experiences in the comments to help others on their path.

Photo: Copyright PhotoXpress.com

Many of us, myself included, whiz through the day barely taking notice of what we are doing. 

We fail to be present in the moment.  We just hurry through our mental or written to-do list  until it is time to quit for the day.

The days go by.  The weeks go by.  The months go by and before we know it, we have hurried another year of our life away.  I think this is a terrible way to live.

I struggle with living in and enjoying the moment

Okay, there I’ve admitted it.  I have a problem being present in the moment and truly drinking in the satisfaction it has to offer.

My mind is usually preoccupied with what’s next.  I’m already pressing myself to get to the next thing or I’m worried and feeling guilty about how I’m wasting time not getting to the next thing. 

I often feel the thing I’m doing now is encroaching on the time I need to get the next thing done.  I’m usually in a hurry and sometimes it really is for no reason. 

Rushing for me is a habit.  I’m also addicted to efficiency.  Is it apparent yet that I want to get things done?  Again, it is so I can get to whatever is next.  I have to meet the demands of home, work, blogging, children and whatever else I can conjure up.

I can feel it right now.  I want to hurry up and finish this article.  I need to get it done so, I can get it published, so it will be ready for the artificial deadline I’ve set in my mind and so I can move on to get other things done.

Are you feeling it?  Do you want to hurry up and get to the point of this article so you can move on to the next thing?

Hurriedness is a disease that robs us of enjoyment in life

Is this a disease?!?  I’m pretty sure it is at least for me.

Wiktionary defines disease as:

An abnormal condition of the body or mind that causes discomfort or dysfunction; distinct from injury insofar as the latter is usually instantaneously acquired.

I’d say that my hurriedness and efficiency are abnormal.  This is not how we were intended to live.  It is dysfunctional.  It does not lead to the best life possible.

Hurrying and being ultra-efficient are often enemies to true enjoyment in life.  It creates stress and anxiety which are detrimental to my physical health.

I’d classify hurriedness as a cancer of life itself.  It is a disease that eats away at my life from the inside.  It destroys all that I’ve worked so hard to achieve because it steals the enjoyment and satisfaction from it.

I realize that hurrying through life is the wrong way to live

I’ve really began to see that I hurry too often.  I just do not take the time to savor what I’m doing.  I’m convinced that this is very detrimental to living life to the fullest.

As an example, I love to write, but I usually fail to take the time to delight in it.

We write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospection.
~ Anais Nin

I pressure myself to get it done instead of relishing in the process.  Why?!?

The crazy thing is that I do this to myself.  No one else is responsible for it.  I push myself to the point where I drain most of the enjoyment from everything!

Hurrying leaves me feeling empty and unfulfilled.  I get to the end of the day and I’m just  tired and stressed instead of satisfied for a job well done.

How I’ve decided to enjoy the present moment

I am beginning to understand that it is in these tiny moments that we truly milk the honey out of life.

Kiss your life.
Accept it, just as it is.
Today.
Now.
So that those moments of happiness
you’re waiting for don’t pass you by.
~Philip Bosman

Here is some of what I’m going to do to make sure the happiness in my life doesn’t pass me by.

• Slow down and be present in the moment
• Stop waiting for that one big success to come along to be happy
• Practice gratefulness for the small things that make life fun
• Focus my attention on things I enjoy doing
• Stop multi-tasking so often
• Really listen to people and engage them in conversation

Will this work?  I honestly don’t know.  I’ve been the way I am for so long, it is going to be a struggle, but I’ve committed myself to living more consciously and with less hurry.

What practical suggestions would you offer to help me?

Photo by nattu

The symptoms of an overwhelming life.

Some of us don’t even realize we are living life in the fast lane.  We don’t even slow down long enough to recognize how tired and overwhelmed we are.  Here are some signs that you are doing too much:

• You feel antsy if you are sitting doing nothing.
• You can’t remember the last time you took a day off from your normal routine.
• Your calendar is so full that if you have one unexpected delay your whole day is blown.
• You fight with your spouse about spending too much time at work.
• You haven’t seen your kids in more than a week.  (hopefully exaggerated!)
• Your spiritual life is null and void.
• You are burned out and often daydream about running away.
• You feel physically run down and worn out everyday.

Are you in denial about the pace of your life?

We often think it is only the workaholics of the world that have a problem with balance in their lives, but that is not true.  Everyone is susceptible to this problem.  Stay-at-home moms often get caught in this trap by trying to be super-moms.  They are constantly running their kids from one activity to the next.  They believe this is doing what’s best for their children, but in reality they are just passing on the disease.

Living at break-neck speed is not living life to the fullest.

We all need time to rest and recuperate.  We rush through life at such a pace that we seldom slow down long enough to enjoy what we have.  Why pass this bad habit along to your children?  Isn’t it better to teach them to fully engage in life?  Don’t we want them to stop and smell the roses?  If you think about the best moments of your life, they didn’t occur when you were rushing from one thing to the next.  No, they most likely were the times when you got away from it all and took the time to rest, reflect, and attend to the really important matters of your life.

How to overcome the addiction of busyness.

It is not enough to be busy; so are the ants. The question is: what are we busy about?
~Henry David Thoreau

Busyness and hurriedness is an epidemic in our society.  It is stealing our joy and causing us to lose out on some of the best times that life has to offer.  One day we are going to wake up and our kids will be grown, our health will be failing, and we will realize we rushed by everything that was truly important.  How do we stop this madness?

1.  STOP!

The first thing to do is take a time-out.  We need to force ourselves to take a break.  One way that my wife and I do this is by going camping.  We get out of our normal environment, away from the regular hustle and bustle.  It is only then that we realize how tired we really are.  Once we are away, we don’t feel compelled to do things.  In just a few hours, we relax. 

I highly encourage you to get away.  So often, even our vacations are a rush from one activity to the next.  Plan some time where you don’t have anything to do.  This will help you gain perspective and evaluate your life.  Spend some time in quiet contemplation.

2.  Evaluate your priorities.

Make a written list of what is really important to you.  Now be honest.  Are you doing the things that truly have value to you?  Do you have a meaningful relationship with your kids?  How’s your marriage?  Are the things you spend the majority of your time doing going to be important to you come the end of your life? 

Obviously, we all have certain aspects of our lives that we have to do even though they are less pleasant.  I’m not advocating being irresponsible.  We have to do the day-to-day things necessary to get by, but as Stephen Covey teaches, you have to put first things first.  Unless you define a set of priorities and then consciously choose to live according to those priorities, you are likely to be swept downstream by the priorities of others.

3.  Learn to say, “No!”

We need to eliminate the unimportant activities in our lives in order to slow down.  The only way to do this is to learn to say no.  There is often a lot of pressure to go, go, go.  As parents, we feel pressure from other parents, teachers, coaches, and even our children.  However, we are the adults and the only ones responsible for our lives.  We must draw the line and limit our commitments.

This may be tough because you may feel you are already committed.  Wean yourself off as many unimportant things as quickly as possible.  Yes, you will probably feel some resistance from others, but they’ll get over it and you’ll thank yourself for it.

4.  Delegate beyond your comfort zone.

Start delegating more responsibilities at work and at home.  We often hang onto too many things because we think we are the only ones that can do it right, but this is killing us.  We have to start letting others take on more tasks.  Teaching and coaching others to take care of themselves can be time-consuming, but once you have them trained, then you can step back. 

In order to get any real value from this, you have to take it one step further than what is comfortable for you.  When I do this, I usually find that others can do more than what I gave them credit for.  Even if there are some issues, it usually isn’t the end of the world.  I often blow things up in my mind which causes me to hold back from delegating as much as I should.

5.  Seek guidance to slow down.

In your quiet time, seek guidance for your life.  Pray, meditate, reflect, and read wisdom literature to find direction.  I highly suggest writing down the highlights of your thoughts during these periods so you can return to them often.  In order to break the habits of busyness and hurriedness, we have to continually remind ourselves of our true priorities and keep ourselves mindfully making the right choices.

Where does the guidance for your life come from?  Go back to that source of wisdom and tap into it again.  It will help you realign yourself with what is important.

Get control and you won’t feel so overwhelmed.

We have to break the cycle of rushing from one thing to the next so we can focus on our priorities.  This will help us to truly live life to the fullest.  Being busy and having a cram-packed schedule is NOT living the best life possible.  It is during the periods where we have things in order that we find inner joy and peace. 

What are you going to do to stop feeling so overwhelmed?

Photo by xxxtoff