I AM

A dear friend passed along the following poem which I would like to share:

I was regretting the past and fearing the future.
Suddenly my Lord was speaking:
“My name is I AM”
He paused.
I waited. He continued,

“When you live in the past
with its mistakes and regrets,
it is hard. I am not there.
My name is not I WAS.

When you live in the future,
with its problems and fears,
it is hard. I am not there.
My name is not I WILL BE.

When you live in this moment
it is not hard. I am here.
My name is I AM.”

I thought it was so appropriate for this blog. Isn't it interesting that no one names God? He names himself. And when he names himself it is with the words "I AM". God is not just sitting out somewhere in the future waiting for me to get to where he is...nor is he peering at me from the past clucking his tongue at all the wrong things I've done. He is fully present in my current reality and he's not impatient with me nor is he anxious about what I might do or might not do. What I sense in the fullness of his presence is an intense love. More on this later...

The First Post

So, I have had this blog spot for several months now and have been hesitant to start writing anything in it. I've written a hundred entries in my mind...mostly while I'm standing in the shower or sitting in some equally inconvenient spot. Of course, all the entries I've written in my mind are brilliant and interesting! The nice thing about writing this blog in my mind is that nobody can pass any judgment on the words that I write. I'm not sure why I'm terrified about writing down what I'm thinking, but I admit to being scared of writing. (Deep exhale...) Now that I've gotten that out there, I'm not sure where to begin. Here's a quote from a book I just read (Eat, Pray, Love) that says the sort of thing I've been thinking for some time and the reason I titled this blog Living in the Now. I'll start with this quote today and go from there...

The other problem with all this swinging through the vines of thought is that
you are never where you are. You are always digging in the past or
poking at the future, but rarely do you rest in this moment. It's something
like the habit of my dear friend Susan, who--whenever she sees a beautiful
place--exclaims in near panic, "It's so beautiful here! I want to come back
here someday!" and it takes all of my persuasive powers to try to convince
her that she is already here. If you're looking for union with the divine, this kind of forward/backward whirling is a problem. There's a reason they call God a presence--because God is right here, right now. In the present is the only place to find Him, and now is the only time.

I want to learn to be fully present in each moment...the glorious moments, the boring & tedious moments...even the bad ones...to know and feel the present so well that it ties the past and future together...that the past and the future collapse into the present. Perhaps in the space of that moment the essence of God will drip into my life. Even one drop will do! The biggest problem I have right now is that the "moment" seems so fleeting. It's hard to capture the essence of the moment long enough to truly savor it. Like capturing the elusive scent of an evening flower on the breeze long enough to enjoy it! Anyway...I'll see where this takes me.