The Present Moment — My Escape
I turned 28 in May and I am starting to feel old. People tell me, I am young, I have time etc. etc. But it doesn’t feel that way to me. I feel a huge difference between 23 yr old me and now.
I have accomplished many things in my life, but they feel like a minute too late. A later arrival to a wedding. When I look back I see regret more than progress. When I look at now, I see menial progress, and regression is some areas, when I look into the future I am deadened by uncertainty.
There is a lot of discomfort and frustration about where I am right now. The minds tell me I should be way ahead, all factors considered. It compares with others and brings about time elapsed. This type of thinking leaves me with very little genuine appreciation for where I am right now. I think gratitude is only worthwhile if it is sincere. Old and new music trigger my frustrations, regret and reality of time, new music makes me feel old, old music makes me feel that I wasted time. At times silent thoughts of suicide and ending it all flash by — I do not entertain them but they do come.
The things that used to give me pleasure have become sources of pain, in the gym I train with one eye open — there is the fear of reaggravating injuries. Going home, and seeing my room makes — question if I would wholeheartedly be welcomed back if I fall, have I become an unworthy expense? Deep down I know I have disappointed them since despite the much expenditure on my studies I have not come out as an high income earner. I haven’t really given back to them in a significant life changing way. The thrill that I once got from money now has turned to the resentment of not being able to make or have more. I have tied my value and usefulness especially to women I would date to money — this thinking has seeped deeply into my psyche. There a lot of questions that run through my mind. e.g.. Am I good enough for the market? Or I am I a bare minimum vet?
My faith in God has come very low, the only prayer I truly believe God hears is to be protected on the roads. I have been in the city for a decade and I have always been safe on the roads, the prayers that border things that are beyond my ability or not deemed by my mind as wishful thinking in any way are the ones that I have faith in, the rest I don’t really trust.
I quit therapy after 5 sessions, I don’t feel the impact of it that much. Unless I think back hard.
Despite all these and more, I only have one go to that has somewhat proved to work to so far, and that is entering the present moment as an escape from all these problems. I call it an escape because when I enter the moment all these issue do not matter anymore. For a moment I feel satisfied, at peace and blissed out.
The worry about it for me has always been finding a consistent and reliable way back to the moment. Time spent outside the moment is majorly a play in the muddy waters described snippily above; at times I get so lost that I cannot find my way back to the moment. As I write this I am glad to say that I think I found a reliable way back to the moment. I found a way to dissolve this ever unsatisfied mind of mine. This is through entering into presence. The simple answer is through a form of contemplation that works for me. Within the blink of an eye, I am already on the doorstep to the moment and soon engulfed with the gloriousness of it — the moment. I will shy away from recommending it to anyone because I doubt if this is available to anyone who hasn’t had glimpses of ‘awakening’, ‘enlightenment’ or ‘satori/moksha’ — which happened to me 4 years ago and
I still do not know why it chose me?
But it brought with it a gateway, to this glorious present moment — my escape. May I one day slip in it and never come back…to this mundane and hamster wheel word.
