We are born with only one obligation – to be completely who we are. Yet how much of our time is spent comparing ourselves to others, dead and alive? This is encouraged as necessary in the pursuit of excellence. Yet a flower in its excellence does not yearn to be a fish, and a fish in its unmanaged elegance does not long to be a tiger. But we humans find ourselves always falling into the dream of another life. Or we secretly aspire to the fortune or fame of people we don’t really know. When feeling badly about ourselves, we often try on other skins rather than understand and care for our own. Yet when we compare ourselves to others, we see neither ourselves nor those we look up to. We only experience the tension of comparing, as if there is only one ounce of being to feed all our hungers.
Mark Nepo, The Book Of Awakening
When we learn to be where we are, we gain perspective on life. Yesterday loses its hold on us and tomorrow loses its allure. Where we are becomes the ground of our salvation, the reason for our joy and the acme of our salvation…..Mindfulness calms the storms of life and gives them meaning. [It] makes the present, present and gives us back the energy that endless worry and countless calculation drain. It concentrates what has become scattered and brings us home to ourselves. 
The moment is our constant guide. It is the doorway to all that matters. And slowing our presence to meet the heart of each moment opens us to the mystery and power of life. As Russell Means of the Lakota tribe says “Just because someone has invented a clock doesn’t mean you have to hurry through life”. When we rush by the moment, any moment, we miss the deep awareness that is always waiting to show itself. So often, when feeling bereft, we chase what we think is special, when that deep aliveness is waiting in the moment we are in.
There is some interest in some circles about ancient calendars and texts and the end of the world happening these days. Now I do not wish to comment on the accuracy of such predictions but simply to see what such an interest can reveal in some people. There is a lot of uncertainty and instability in the world today, stemming from human tragedies, economic problems, the difficulties between different views of culture and values, tension between religions and within religions, and from storms and natural disasters. And there are always uncertainties in our personal lives. Things change. People close to us get ill or move away. This can make us feel very insecure. One way of dealing with not-knowing and with the fundamental unease that is at the basis of our existence is to seek something outside, or someone stronger than us, to steady us on this uncertain ground. So we provide an explanation for things we cannot understand and that explanation, even if it means the end of the world, seems preferable to not knowing why some things happen. It is a radical way of dealing with the fact that, at a fundamental level, there is a groundlessness inherent in our existence. It is also an extreme variant of our common, everyday way of working with the unsatisfactory nature of individual moments – we “lean towards” something in the future, and this distracts us from this moment and how it actually is. What we are trying in our practice is not to focus on any future, “better” or “more secure” moment, but on this one, even if it is not as we would want it. The best way to prepare for the future – or the “end of the world” if you like – is to care for this moment and then the next moment. There are enough distractions in the world today, including these spiritual or mythical ones, pulling us away from noticing where our life is, now.
