Where is the present moment?

[fetus]

Does it even exist?

Every moment, we're planning what we're going to do next. Not necessarily in years, or even days. In seconds or milliseconds. For instance, I'm planning what I'm typing here. I'm anticipating which letter I'm going to type next. It's like the present moment is sandwiched in between the past and the future, and it grows smaller and smaller the more we think about it.

Or am I just overthinking again?

 

[Riva]

Are you referring to the cliche term: live in the present moment? I might be able to explain it if you wish.

 

[Frosty]

Present moment is now. Always there, some people just choose to acknowledge it more often.

 

[Evee]

being = being present
being present = temporality
so being = temporality (presence)

 

[gromit]

I think you are most in the present moment when you are not thinking about anything except exactly what you are doing. Very easy in sports and sex and that sort of thing. You get lost in the flow of things. More difficult in other settings. But even with sports, for example, you can have a general idea of how you want things to go, in the back of your mind, while you are reacting immediately to everything around you, teammates, oponents, unexpected events.

So it's a balance between learning from mistakes/what worked well in the past, reacting to real-time information, and having a plan for where you're going.

 

[gromit]

All the advice about "being in the present moment", I think it means to enjoy what you have right now. And to really listen to people when they are talking to you. Take in not only what they are saying but also the feelings around what they are saying.

But of course we have to think about the past and plan for the future in order to survive, so it doesn't mean to ONLY live in the present.

 

[BadOctopus]

Well, that's easy. It's now. No wait... nnnnnow. NOW!

Then. It was then. You just missed it.

 

[Flâneuse]

^Yep. The present is all that exists, but it can't be pinned down. Once you define a brief stretch of time as "now", it's already in the past.

 

[indra]

^Yep. The present is all that exists, but it can't be pinned down. Once you define a brief stretch of time as "now", it's already in the past.

From one thread of thought it is said now is never not.

 

[violett]

I can't believe this is even a question.

 

[Jaguar]

Okay. What are you people drinking?

 

[fetus]

Okay. What are you people drinking?

Water, with a slight lemon and berry aftertaste.

 

[laurapants08]

Its somewhere between the past and the future

 

[Qlip]

I don't think you've looked deep enough. Did the past really exist? Isn't it hasty to assume the future will?

 

[Cygnus]

Didn't Bill Clinton try to make them define "is" when they took him to court on his sexual affair?


To me, this music seems like a good example of something that's out of the moment, however pleasantly so.

 

[Galena]

I don't know. It fell out of my pocket.

 

[violett]

I don't know. It fell out of my pocket.

wait....I think I found it....right here and now....

 

[Frosty]

The culmination of all other moments before and after it.

 

[Nico_D]

The present is what comes after the past and right and long before the future. It's inconsequential to me, I can't and don't know how to live in it without thinking about the causality of things, where they are coming from and where they are going. There certainly is a present moment but I don't find it that interesting. Or it could be, I don't know.

 

[Obsidius]

The present moment is now... Just because you're planning the future, or remembering the past, doesn't mean the present doesn't exist or that it is "small". The past existed, the future will exist, and the present is what exists, I think that's the easiest and most clear-cut distinction one can make.