What Will You Do Today?
Today will be what we make of it.
Whether you begin your day feeling refreshed or sleepy; excited or anxious; with apprehension or confidence – today will be what you and I make it out to be.
It is easy to forget that each day brings about something new. Yes, there are routines to every single day of our lives. We wake, we do stuff, we sleep. Frequently, we simply allow the day to just happen. We do not accept nor celebrate each day for the gift that it is.
This is something I keep returning to. As I am striving to better live in the here-and-now, this is a major part of that. Today, this moment, is the now. In this moment I am listening to the writer’s mix I created years ago, waking up from last night’s sleep, and writing this post. Right now, in this moment, you are reading the words in the present that I crafted in the past.
Time is an illusion. The great scientist Albert Einstein made mention of this a few times. “The only reason for time is so that everything doesn’t happen at once.” and “People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”
When we lose sight of this, we tend to focus on the past and the future. While it is certainly important to not forget past events and to learn from them, we cannot go backwards. You cannot undo the things that are done, you need to do new things. One of the most persistent issues I see in government and politics is a near-obsession with returning us to a past that never truly existed anyhow.
Today is a new day.
Right here, right now, we are facing the day in which we stand. When we acknowledge this, we empower ourselves to make the most of the time and place.
A lot of us trip up on thoughts about where we want to be. Who we want to be. There are goals to be reached and achievements to be had. Trouble is, we wind up looking ahead to them.
When I am ten pounds lighter I will buy those shoes. After I retire I will take that trip to Europe. Once I make my first million dollars I will consider myself a success. When my novels become a best-seller I will truly call myself a writer.
Consciousness creates reality. So long as the things we want are ahead of us, they will ALWAYS be ahead of us. Always, whether we like it or not. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve said that I am on the cusp of getting where I want to go…and never cross the invisible threshold to arrive. Why? Because it remains ahead of me.
One of the keys to changing this is recognizing the power of today, and the here-and-now. Instead of seeing things we desire and keeping our focus on the thing we want to achieve, we need to be in the now.
Because our society is particularly obsessed with linear time, this is particularly challenging. If I am walking a path to a goal, then the goal is ahead of me. Maybe so…but that doesn’t lessen the importance of the path itself. Every day is new and even with its similarities to the day before, unique. Different activities, people, places, challenges will occur every single day. When we are in the now, we can better handle the curves, obstacles, and challenges we encounter.
Today is the here-and-now.
Yes, I recognize that this is a paradox. The idea of Pathwalking is to choose your own destiny, set your own path in life and decide how you want life to be. One aspect of this is that there is an end goal. I am choosing to take this path to this place. However, it’s important to remember that the path itself is something important and unique.
The difference between those of us who choose to walk our own path in life and those who don’t boils down to choice and decision. Most people just go about their lives, accepting reality as it is. They let life live them, and they don’t strive to do or be more than they are handed. Some people are content with that, and if that is the case, more power to them. Many are discontent. There are people who express their discontent privately, others who do so publicly, and still others who do so violently.
Pathwalking is about living life, not letting life just pass you by. One of the best ways to manifest the things we want is to be aware of our thoughts, feelings, and actions. We are conscious creators, each and every one of us. When we take control of our thoughts, we gain control of our feelings. From there we control intent, and use it to take actions to traverse the paths we choose.
Today is another day, and like yesterday and tomorrow we have choices. Do we choose to curl up in a ball and await death or stagnate? Make no choices and just let life live us along the way? Or do we take control, and choose things today that will make us happy and take us down the paths we desire?
Today is your day.
Every day we get to choose. There are going to be days where we are tired, sore, apathetic, and so we just go with it. Wake up, slog through the day, go to bed and sleep. That’s ok from time to time, but we still need to take at least a moment in that day to be in the here-and-now. Meditate. Exercise. Have great sex. Savor a delicious meal. The more small moments we take to be in the now, the easier it is to build up to being constantly in the now.
The paths we choose will take us to unexpected places, many of which can be even better than the places we thought we wanted to go. Because we tend to get super attached to concepts of how life is supposed to be, we sometimes find this hard to accept. When we are living more in the here-and-now, today, we are prepared to discover amazing things, and enjoy some truly spectacular experiences.
Today is a new day. It is unique, it will come and go, and then tomorrow will become today. Do you want to choose for yourself to live life, or to let life live you?
What will you do today?
This is the three-hundred twenty-sixth entry in my series. These weekly posts are ideas for, and my personal experiences with, walking along the path of life. I share this journey as part of my desire to make a difference in this world along the way.
Thank you for joining me. Feel free to re-blog and share.
The first year of Pathwalking, including some expanded ideas, is available here.
After more than 6 years of Pathwalking, I have launched a Patreon to garner support for these works, and more.
