JUST BEING

We spend most of our time replaying our past or rehearsing our future.  The present, where we actually are, where our lives are in fact taking place, we pay little attention to.  If anything, the present is an obstacle to where we really want to be, which is in the previous moment or in the next moment. 

The present moment is a place of waiting, waiting for the next memory or waiting for what is going to happen next, in the future.  Compounding the problem is how fleeting the present moment, the "now," is.  Where exactly is “now?”  No sooner do we believe we have it than it drops into the past or slips into the future.   

The solution is simply to stop thinking, or to think only when we must for practical purposes.  In Zen this is called no-mind, "mushin" in Japanese, or "mind without mind.”  No-mind is just being. 

All things other than humans live this way.  A rock just is, a tree just is, other animals just are.  They just "be."