The Master held his head high and proclaimed in a thunderous voice:
"To avert misery, you must live in the present. The past is gone, and the future not yet here. The present moment is all there is. There is no point regretting the past and fearing the future. Be happy in the present moment."
At his feet, people deposited currency notes designed to last ten years, and whose decreasing value over time was the headline in that day's paper. That paper was being used to wrap flower offerings because the flowers wouldn't last long, exposed to the heat.
In the other room, his disciples were busy sending invitations for the next week's meeting in the neighboring city.
Outside the building, some gaunt workers were busy widening the road and were looking forward to getting rest at home in the evening. The road was planned long back but only recently the municipality had received enough funds to start the construction.
A few miles away, grain in gunny bags were being stored in large warehouses to last till the next harvest.
In the capital city of that state, about a hundred miles away, a college professor was busy writing the second chapter of his book on time series analysis. He anticipated there to be twelve chapters in total.
Far away in the mountains, many thousands of miles away, an activist organization was busy convincing the illiterate village folk that some newly discovered vaccines might cause discomfort for a few days, but they protected from a host of diseases for the rest of one's life.
In a busy Starbucks cafe on the Wall Street in New York, bond traders were communicating with each other about currency futures and how 2008 must never happen again.
And many millions of miles away, the Voyager 1 spacecraft, launched from planet Earth in 1977, was close to entering interstellar space and was still expected to preserve the "Golden Record" of our civilization.
Meanwhile, the Master's discourse had ended. As it was time.
"To avert misery, you must live in the present. The past is gone, and the future not yet here. The present moment is all there is. There is no point regretting the past and fearing the future. Be happy in the present moment."
At his feet, people deposited currency notes designed to last ten years, and whose decreasing value over time was the headline in that day's paper. That paper was being used to wrap flower offerings because the flowers wouldn't last long, exposed to the heat.
In the other room, his disciples were busy sending invitations for the next week's meeting in the neighboring city.
Outside the building, some gaunt workers were busy widening the road and were looking forward to getting rest at home in the evening. The road was planned long back but only recently the municipality had received enough funds to start the construction.
A few miles away, grain in gunny bags were being stored in large warehouses to last till the next harvest.
In the capital city of that state, about a hundred miles away, a college professor was busy writing the second chapter of his book on time series analysis. He anticipated there to be twelve chapters in total.
Far away in the mountains, many thousands of miles away, an activist organization was busy convincing the illiterate village folk that some newly discovered vaccines might cause discomfort for a few days, but they protected from a host of diseases for the rest of one's life.
In a busy Starbucks cafe on the Wall Street in New York, bond traders were communicating with each other about currency futures and how 2008 must never happen again.
And many millions of miles away, the Voyager 1 spacecraft, launched from planet Earth in 1977, was close to entering interstellar space and was still expected to preserve the "Golden Record" of our civilization.
Meanwhile, the Master's discourse had ended. As it was time.
1 comment:
I don't get it. It is possible to be present in the moment but still plan for the future as necessary. My experience suggests that I waste too much time thinking about the past and worrying about the future. The problem is not one of planning but negative dissipation.
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