Day 2: Present-Moment Awareness
Mindful of what? Mindful that you have been thrown out of the present moment. When you are present, you are in alert. When you aren’t present, you have lost alertness. Everything happens inside. It’s not that you are immune to external forces, only that when you notice that you aren’t present, you get back there.
Meditation, if practiced over a period of time, makes it much easier to return to present-moment awareness. Yet you can also do a quick remedy by finding a quiet place to be alone, close your eyes, take some deep breaths, and find your center again. Doing this several times a day is a good routine, because it alerts you in a mindful way to what it feels like to be steady and present.
If you are present, here and now, you are alert. The ego makes a mistake by always trying to get its own way, putting up resistance, or being right. In reality, nothing throws you out of yourself like demanding to get what you want, resisting other people, and always having to be right.
How to Stay Alert:
To translate this into daily life, all you have to do is to imitate what every cell does:
- Trust in your existence.
- See yourself as multi-dimensional, simultaneously merging body, mind, and spirit.
- Favor cooperation over competition.
- Take a holistic rather than a fragmented approach.
- Attend to any need that arises as soon as it appears.
- Accept other people as your equal, treating them with respect and dignity.
- Take healing seriously, meaning physical, mental, and spiritual healing all together.
- Be as self-aware as possible.
- Realize that the present moment is the only time that’s fully real.
- See yourself as constantly growing and evolving, and live according to this vision.
Quite a long laundry list, you might say. But it boils down to one thing only: Live with present-moment awareness. That’s the ultimate secret that no amount of self-control exerted by the ego can achieve. By redefining what it means to be Alert, you can achieve something invaluable for your personal success and happiness.
