Posts Tagged: the present

“Unwrapping the Present”

On December 11, 2023 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

A friend of mine sent me an email report on his day yesterday and commented on the one-day-at-a-time slogan of twelve-step programs.

I replied, “Just for today—yes! Imagine someone who gave you a whole bunch of beautifully wrapped gifts and then said, ‘There is a catch: you have to open them all at the same time.’

Suddenly, gifts would become a problem. Indeed, they would become an impossible chore.

Have fun unwrapping today and making good use of it for yourself and for others!”

There was a Family Circle cartoon decades ago that I thought summed it up very nicely. A little girl named Dolly was explaining time to her littler brother, Jeffy. “Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, today is a gift of God, which is why we call it the present.”

But for my A.D.D. mind, a day is way too much for me to unwrap. There is a Christian song entitled “The Next Five Minutes.” It’s a good song and I like it. However, there are days when even the next five minutes is way too much for me to process. I need to concentrate on the next thirty seconds.

Admittedly, not every day or every moment in the day seems to be a good gift. As I was writing this post, regrets for how I lived in the past attacked in the present moment. The people I’ve hurt were all horribly present before my heart’s eye at the same time. Sometimes, the present is a waking nightmare and hell in the here and the now. As someone has said, “Every day is judgment day.”

But even when the present is profoundly painful, it is still a gift to be opened. There is a saying, “Good things come in small packages.” That is true. What is also true is that things that are ultimately good often come in very ugly packages that we don’t want to unwrap.

Still, there are many beautiful gifts in every day—sunrises and sunsets, full moons, and stubborn wildflowers that insist on blooming even in the winter. There is my little dog’s wagging of her stubby tail and my wife’s morning hair that she calls “bed head” but which I call wildly beautiful.

And so, I say to myself and to you, “Have fun unwrapping today and making good use of it for yourself and for others!”

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“IMAGINING DIFFERENT FUTURES”

On June 22, 2017 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

I have signed up to receive daily TED talks in my e mail in box.  My first one was a talk by Anab Jain, and was titled “Why We Need to Imagine Different Futures.”

I am not all that big on the future.  I’m still trying to decide if I like the present.  Don’t even get me started on the past!

However, I thought to myself, “Well, I’ve signed up for this, so I’d better listen to it.”  I’m glad that I did. (If you want to see and hear the entire TED talk, go to https://www.ted.com/talks/anab_jain_why_we_need_to_imagine_different_futures, accessed 06-20-2017.)

Jain gave a number of examples of her team’s research in various fields.  However, I was especially intrigued by some of her comments that are, I think, widely applicable.

For example, concerning climate change, she spoke of exploring different “possible futures.”  Such exploration tries to “. . . prepare for that future by developing tools and attitudes that can help us find hope—hope that can inspire action.”

. . .

“. . . [C]reating concrete experiences can bridge the disconnect between today and tomorrow.  By putting ourselves into different possible futures, by becoming open and willing to embrace the uncertainty and discomfort that such an act can bring, we have the opportunity to imagine new possibilities.  . . . We can move beyond hope into action.”

Christians should be among the forward-looking people in the world.  Instead, we are among the most backward-looking folks.  Years ago, I remember (!?!   See!  I’m looking back!) someone speaking of “. . . the seven last words of the church: “We’ve never done it that way before!”  Churches tend to forget the truth of a Will Rogers’ saying: “The good old days ain’t so good any more, and they probably never was.”

To imagine different futures doesn’t mean ignoring the past, nor does it mean that we don’t live in the present.  Rather, imagining different futures means “. . . developing tools and attitudes that can help us find hope—hope that can inspire action.”  It is only when we begin to develop tools, attitudes, and hope that our actions can really make a difference in the present and for the future.

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“DYING EVERY NIGHT, REBORN EVERY DAY”

On June 6, 2017 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

 

“. . . I die daily” (Paul, 1 Corinthians 15:31).

“So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today” (Matthew 6:34, New Living Translation).

“And come what may at the break of each day
We all begin anew once more, we all begin anew” (The Moody Blues, “The Other Side of Life”).

I am toying with a very strange idea.  (For those of you who know me well, that probably doesn’t seem strange at all.)

Here is the idea: Every night, when I go to bed, I die.  Every morning, when I awake, I am reborn.

The reason why the notion of dying every night and being reborn every morning is helpful to me is this: I am in the import business.  I tend to import regrets from the past and worries about the future into my present.  My present is heavily mortgaged due to this.  I am not a particularly good business person.

I have a past, and it is not a very good one in many ways.  It is comforting to me to remember that I don’t have to remember all that stuff all the time.

Now, don’t get me wrong.  I am not saying that my past evils don’t have ongoing results.  They flat out do!  However, focusing on them all the time doesn’t help me to atone for them.  If the cross of Jesus Christ didn’t do that, I am a dead man, as dead as dead can be.  Remaining focused on past wrong-doing tends to lead me toward despair at an accelerating pace.  Furthermore, the more I focus on my past, the more likely I am to go back to it.

I was out on the Little Miami Bike Trail the other day, when I heard a father give his young son a very sound piece of wisdom.  I was passing this family, when this little guy looked back.  Of course, he steered into my path.  I was anticipating such a possibility, and hit the brakes.  As I went around the family, I heard the little guy’s dad say, “Don’t look back, or you’ll go the wrong way!”  The dad might as well have been talking to me.

When I start the new day with a new version of myself, I find it much easier to be at peace, and to get things done.  Perhaps there is a reason why we are given our moments little by little.  Maybe, just maybe, God or the Universe or someone/something set things up that way.

Have a good day, but be sure to die tonight!  However, I do hope that you’ll be reborn in the morning!

 

 

 

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