@Mark, fantastic that you are seeing all of this going on. Seems like the narrator of Ego’s still busy doing his thing, but you’re no longer really buying into the habitual stories. Things are, they are not the stories or the reason we tell our selves about them. I wake up tired, I don’t look for reasons, I’m simply tired, and work with that.

I’ve found it really liberating/enabling to no longer assign stories to states. Telling myself I’m tired due to bad sleep, and carrying that around all day actually influences my whole day. Letting the story go, and being present, it’s a beautiful thing.

May all beings be happy, may all beings be peaceful.

Peace,

Wade

Thanks.

@Cedric, great to see you asking some tough questions.

The only answer I can provide to all your questions is try it out for your self. Experience that which is beyond the words and see what you think of it all. Anything said after this point is intellectual, and is more a distraction, but I would like to try answer.

The question you ask about the now (satori) ever exist, can only be asked from the relative perspective. Satori takes place in the absolute, thus when it takes place there is no satori taking place, to say satori is taking place is to not be in satori.

Time is a invention of man, useful for co-ordination.

Your final question, that requires either a life or a we to live separate from the other, like one is outside the other, or one controls the other. From satori, nirvana, now, absolute dimension there is neither a life or an us. There just is.

That’s my take on all of the above, but that’s only my take. As I said @ the top, it’s our own experience, this is based on my understanding, and who knows if it’s right or wrong.

It’s a pretty heady topic, and regardless of the answers it’s great to see some really amazing and big questions. Thank you all for your questions and answers.

Gassho,

Wade

Let me suggest one thing because I like to do something similar… although it is hard for me to remember to do so. Next time you eat alone, and have some spare time, try chewing your food to a count of 30, before you swallow. In that time maybe around 20, allow the food to rest on the back of your tongue, perhaps rest under your tongue. Don’t watch TV, read, listen to music… just be there alone with your food. If you need to think, consider where that food came from and appreciate the ease at which, I assume and hope, it came to you. That will be eating in the NOW. If you like the experience… let it serve as a simple example of why NOW is important. Then you can consider being in the NOW in other circumstances. I need to remind myself most of the time… that’s why I wear my Now Watch. But that reminder stills my mind, focuses my attention on whatever is at hand, it’s kinda “stop and smell the roses” type of experience. Everything is more beautiful and to me that’s an indication when I’m in the NOW I’m doing something important.

Perhaps this quote attributed to Osho will resonate- “If Past to Future is on a horizontal line, the present moment is not in time – it is an vertical movement – transcending time.” I think it means that the NOW is not a function of time or timelessness… it just is.

I believe your suspicion is correct about connection between the experience of being in the NOW and the realization that you and I, as a individual entities separated from the Universe as a whole, are illusions.

As for whether we live life or does life live us? I like the question. Perhaps we live life only to find out in the end, if it actually lived us. A question of fate or free will I guess. Like you… I don’t know.

*”in the NOW our lives become enriched and our senses become more alive.”* Adam, this is hardly a reason why now is important. It’s like saying eating is important because food tastes good. And I suspect that our senses need to be more atuned before we can live in the now rather than as a result of living in the now.
I wonder is the now any more important than scrartching an itch or anything else in life for that matter?
What drives us to these concepts, be it the now, god, law of attraction? What makes these things seem important? Do we seek these things out of fear, hope, curiosity, a promise of a better future? After all isn’t the placing of importance to anything a form of attachment and isn’t attachment the one thing that prevents us from seeing the moment as it is?
I also suspect that the experience that comes when one is in the now is akin to what is known as satori and the sutras tell us that satori is the realisation that there is no I and if there is no I then who is there to live in the now (or experience satori)? And this begs the question, if there is no I then did the now (satori) ever exist? And if the now does not exist (“now” being a function of time or timelessness) then neither does past or future; time itself. And maybe therein lies the illusion. As I’ve said before, I don’t know.
I also suspect that a key may lie in the question I asked in my previous comment. Do we live life or does life live us?

But ultimately, the NOW is something we all must experience for ourselves to appreciate. It takes practice. Perhaps a tool I created to help bring more presence to people’s lives called The Now Watch can help. It’s a watch that works like any watch but also features the word NOW prominently on the face serving as a reminder that no matter what time of day it is… the time is always NOW.

Please check out http://www.thenowwatch.com and feel free to get in touch. Thanks…

Perhaps we know we’re in the now because of foresight. In other words. We KNOW the now is now, because a moment ago we were expecting it to come. Does that not then make it the future that we’re living in?

It’s all pretty blurry in my mind to be honest. But If you can, for any given moment, be completely IN THAT moment, without consideration for the past or future, you can allow that single moment to be your total experience. This allows that experience to be your completion right then and there, and every moment is thus a true and unique experience.

I guess the difficult part is allowing one self to exclude the past and future. Leave your preconceptions and memories at the door, and enter the ‘now’ with a clean slate, ready to be given new experiences that are void of previous limitations put in place by your combined memories.

Like you I really don’t know… but I feel it’s important. Wish I could articulate myself better.