What Does "Being Present" Feel Like?

A calm space filled with energy

This statue of The Lady at Evergreen always reminds me to be calm and present.

Just like you, I’ve been doing a lot of waiting lately.

At the dentist. In a snaking line outside a café in Surfer’s Paradise, longing to place my order for a morning coffee. On a Cottesloe train platform. At a baggage reclaim area in Perth airport. In a lounge chair anticipating a Zoom call from a son in America. Awaiting the whistle of the red kettle so I can fill my hot water bottle to keep the early morning autumn chill at bay.

A slight restlessness seeps into these times.

Things should be happening faster than they are.

I wish the dental visit was over; that I was taking a sip of that coffee; that the train had already whisked me to my destination; that my tattered suitcase with the tired pink ribbon around its handle was the first piece of luggage to emerge on the clanky carousel, not the last; that I was currently mid-conversation with my son; and that the hot water bottle was warming my back right now.

Old, familiar friends run around inside my head. Irritation. Impatience, Boredom.

My thoughts become a series of accusations about what other people or things should be doing a lot sooner than they are, to make my life easier and more pleasant.

While I’m waiting within this swirling fog of discontent, I hear a little internal voice that sounds a bit like Eckhart Tolle, telling me that now is a good time to practice being present.

What Does Being Present Feel Like?

What does being present feel like?

It's hard to describe.

Sometimes it helps to work backwards, so to speak, therefore I’ll explain it this way.

I can always sense when I’m not being present, so when I don’t sense that I’m not present, then I am present.

Not being present feels prickly and confusing. It’s filled with ingredients like indecision and resentment. It’s an unhappy place.

Being present is a calm space paradoxically filled with energy. It’s suffused with a normally elusive sense of abiding peace and joy.

Welcome Whatever Life Brings You

Being human is complicated. We don’t know what the next split second will bring.

We wake up not knowing if this is the day we will die or whether we still have decades stretching out before us. We could be hit by a meteor, swallowed by the earth, or knocked down by a kid whizzing down the footpath on a skateboard. We may stub our big toe, lose our way on a spaghetti freeway, or find ourselves subpoenaed because we witnessed a crime. Or this may be a day when no troubles rise to meet us and the hours will flow by with the ease and delight exemplified by the waters of the Trevi Fountain splashing whimsically in Rome. We just don’t know.

So, what can we do about this seemingly nightmarish quality of unpredictability? Hide? Run away? Curl up in a ball and give up?

Here’s a quote from Eckhart Tolle to encourage us as we negotiate the ups and downs of life:

Welcome whatever life brings to you in the moment even if it is difficult. Don’t complain because the moment you complain about what is you are in an antagonistic relationship with life, and you will experience life as antagonistic. Life ultimately reflects back to you your state of consciousness.

Being present doesn’t deny difficult situations. It embraces them. 

Be Present This Moment

It’s futile to try to get away from the moment we have been given.

Whatever is happening, it’s best to be present through the experience.

I will soon be reclining in the dentist chair; taking a sip of coffee; stepping aboard the train to the city; wheeling my bag to the airport car park; talking with my son; luxuriating in the warmth of a hot water bottle.

In the meantime, while I wait, I will be present.

I will be a calm space, paradoxically filled with energy.

Being present is the only sane way to live.

With love, Marlane