A Perpetual Now

It has been said that fortune favors the bold, or that the world rewards results, and this might be true, however pedestrian it may sound. In my view, this is an example of a truism; a statement or proposition that is self evidently true yet does nothing to enrich the conversation.

My brother in-law once said “When you hear advice, always consider carefully the character of the person who gives it before you act.” So, I call you to examine the nature of the people from whom you may have heard the opening sentiment. Have they been people of action and determination? Or are they generally people content to whistle plaintive or tedious parables, remaining completely inert, inactive, and boring?

Talk is cheap, after all. Impressive, self-satisfying thoughts are even cheaper. Except, they aren’t cheap. There is a cost incurred by every action, and every inaction. As last week’s quoted author Hannah Arendt wrote “The road to hell may just as well be paved with no intentions as with the proverbial good ones.” You may have noticed that adages and cliches are only ever as valuable as the person using them. To tell an overbearing critic that “talk is cheap” tends to ring true if the critic has an inflated sense of self-worth, as per usual.

Let me elaborate on a quasi-banal sentiment that has helped me confront some tough times in my life. I learned from a contemporary Buddhist writer that, in his view at least, life is a constantly unfolding now. It is a bit abstract, and more than a little esoteric, but the idea basically comes down to the realization that the past and future are an illusion, and that all we have is the present. All we will ever have is the present moment.

Consciousness tends to disguise the present as a series of moments that we have to pay attention to and focus on, or ignore, as the case may be. Then there’s our imagination of the future, and our remembrance of the past. All these things make it difficult to grasp the simple truth that every action is vital and unique. Everything is a perpetual now, now, now. Take action, do what your heart tells you and find a way to live in the essence of the moment, because it’s all we have.