The C.A.T. Principle – Global Ebook Awards GOLD & SILVER Winner for Best Self-Help Non-Fiction Ebook of 2014 & 2016

Part II: The Present and Being in It…

If it’s in the present where our future is made, then the present is the place we must be. We can’t expect to tackle tomorrow’s challenges, if we’re not living to solve those before us today. These are simple words, but not simple to act on.

As easy as it sounds, being in the present is not an easy task. We breathe, eat and sleep; we exist in the present, but do we live in it? Between the past and the future, the present is that sliver in time where things happen or don’t. It’s the place we strive to accomplish amazing things or it’s where we waste time without thought or aim.

Spiritual leader Gautama Buddha (563 BC – 483 BC) stated “Do not dwell in the past; do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.”

It’s this focus of being in the present that lays the groundwork for the future of things to come. It’s our ability to concentrate on the task at hand that determines our fate.

In an age of eternal email checking, text sending and endless chatter by way of television or internet, we’ve come to accept attention deficit disorder as the new norm. Take a walk down any street and people aren’t in the presence of their surroundings. Armed with phone and ear plugs, they stagger the streets zombie-like with eyeballs pinned to their light-emitting, electrode screens. For those not submitting to this culture of ignorance, it’s sometimes an annoying ordeal to walk from point A to B without bumping into these self-absorbed, robot-like creatures. It’s as if they’re in another dimension, enjoying a mind-out-of-body experience. The body is still there, but the mind is clearly not.

If we’re to amount to anything in life, we can’t squander the present by not residing in it. Our days can’t be made of what could have been (called living in the past), nor can they consist of wishing for things to come (called dreaming of the future). The past is over. We treasure it and we value it, but it’s over (see Part I: The Past and What Memories Mean…). We must pay heed to it, but we must never remain there. Just the same, the future is yet to be. It’s not real, but abstract. It’s something that can be, but not necessarily so. There are no guarantees because life doesn’t guarantee. Some may think it does, but it doesn’t, never has and never will.

The only guarantee we have is the one we have by living in the present. We must take the present and make the most of it – that must be our call to action. This doesn’t mean we mustn’t plan for the future. On the contrary, our future is made in our present, and when we let the present slip away, we let the future drift with it…

Next time Part III: The Future – Where Our Dreams Live…

For more check out the Global Ebook Awards GOLD & SILVER Winner of 2014 & 2016, The C.A.T. Principle: Change, Action, Trust – Words to Live By available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. See the latest Amazon reviews here.

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A 2014 Global Ebook Awards GOLD Winner for Best Self-Help Non-Fiction Ebook.

A 2016 Global Ebook Awards SILVER Winner for Best Self-Help Non-Fiction Ebook.