Happiness Directions: Step Five: Let Go of Future Projection. Live Now!

Happiness is not something you postpone for the future; it is something you design for the present.
Jim Rohn

Looking to the Future

How many times have you heard yourself uttering these words: "I will be happy when....(the bills get paid, I get the promotion; I meet my soul mate; the kids get more independent; the kids realize how much they need me :); we get the house of our dreams; when I get better; or when the rest of the world realizes just how awesome I really am lol)" ? Probably too many times to mention right?

We look to the future for the happiness that can only be found in our present.  Projecting our thinking forward  gives us hope which is a wonderful and beautiful thing.  It is also  necessary that we put our desires and intentions out there ...but...we cannot put off happiness for an elusive time that never comes.

All we have to live is right here and right now.  There are no other time frames  or geographical realities.  Everything else is just an imagined fantasy in our minds. 

We have all probably heard the expression: Tomorrow never comes! Well it is true isn't it.  When we get to tomorrow it is today.  When we get to that moment in the future we are projecting towards...it becomes the now, this moment right here, right now.  Does it not?  So in truth there is no future...just this moment and when this moment is done there will be the next moment that becomes this moment and so on and so on on and so on.

All There is...is  Now

All there is... is now.  This is a good thing because  the Now is something we will always have the ability to cope with.  According to Eckhart Tolle , a world renown expert and teacher of present moment living, and author of  The Power of Now (2008) " You can always cope with the Now, but you can never cope with the future, nor do you have to-" ( page 85)  You  don't have to because the future never comes.

Live now.  In this present moment is all you need to be happy, embrace it and whatever is in it as a part of something greater. Stop looking to a time that never comes to make you happy.  Be willing to be happy now!

All is well in my world!

References

Tolle, Eckhart. (2004) The Power of Now. New World Library