Be present. Live in the moment!
I don’t know about you, but I seem to hear those phrases often these days. Or maybe I’m hypersensitive to them because I’m not that good at doing either!
Lately, I was on vacation with my husband. Now, you might think, vacation is the perfect opportunity to be present. To live in the moment.
And that is true.
But, on at least two hiking occasions, I couldn’t help myself. I broke out of the present and started worrying about the future.
Let me explain. I do NOT like traversing steep downhills. This is a serious phobia of mine. So, on one hike, when we started up a VERY STEEP incline, all I could think about was “%&^#, I’m going to have to eventually go down this.”
Luckily, we found another way down on that hike.
I was not so fortunate the following day. First, we climbed something that looked like a ladder, then we came to a field of rocks with a set of steps chiseled into the mountainside.
My immediate reaction was to start obsessing over the fact that we would be coming back down the ladder as well as those steps. There was no other way to return to our car except with a helicopter rescue. (A very unlikely event, unless, of course, I slipped on those rock steps on the way down – just being honest with my thought processes here!)
I watched my husband navigate the ladder and then the steps. Then, I told myself in my most no-nonsense voice that I was going to be present. I was going to live in the moment. I was going to go up those steps and not worry about the return trip until it happened. Then, I could be present for that.
I’m happy to report that I not only successfully navigated both the up and the down on the ladder and those rock steps, I also crossed two other rock fields.
The waterfall we reached was well worth the climb and the descent. As were the moments I was present on the trail.
