The Crunchy Present Moment
It's like a slippery fish
The present moment is a slippery fish. I know it’s powerful, obviously. I know it’s the only place/space/time where I can create, change or feel anything real. But staying here? That’s another story. My brain has deep trenches carved by past and future thinking, and lately, it’s taking a lot of energy to redirect myself back to now. The world is currently so intense and wild.
This is why I love creating and writing. Not writing for an audience, not crafting the perfect sentence, but just writing: especially stream of consciousness, pen moving, words spilling out before I even know what they are. Writing anchors me in the present moment. It bypasses the meaning-making that my mind is so good at. Our minds are brilliant at wanting to analyze, rehash, and predict. Instead, writing invites me to listen, to see what’s actually here right now.
And often what’s here is uncomfortable. Crunchy. The present moment isn’t all peace and stillness, rainbows and unicorns, because it’s also where I feel things I’d sometimes rather avoid. It’s where the emotions precipitated by circumstances from long ago pop up to be witnessed. It’s the only place / space / time where my body can experience them through sensations. If I stay with them, without assigning meaning, they can actually move through me. But the second my mind jumps in and grabs for a story or a reason or a way out, well, I’m gone, lost in the past or future that are full of perceived threats of anxiety or fear or other ruminations.
I suppose this is why meditation is a thing. But sitting still has never been my thing. I prefer moving meditations like writing, walking or anything that allows me to practice presence while in motion. Because that’s the real challenge, isn’t it? Not just touching the present moment, but staying with it as life moves around me.
Last year my osteopath suggested I stop sleeping on my stomach to help my gut health. At first, it felt impossible because it’s my favourite way to sleep! But I kept at it, redirecting my body every time it tried to roll back into old habits. I had some crunchy sleeps at first until one day, I realized: I had done it. I had trained myself into something new.
So if I can do that, I can train myself to stay present, too. To let my writing be a doorway, a reminder to come back, again and again, to the only moment that ever really matters: this one.
The past and future can wait. I can explore the real or perceived threats in my fiction. But for now, I’m here.
What is your favourite practice to stay in the present moment? Do you find it easy? Or crunchy?