Question on the "Now" thing.

[leftyladyfrommo]

So in meditation we try to learn to stay in the "now."

Animals already stay in the "now" and so do sociopaths. So why did we evolve to not stay in the "now?" We stay in the past and future.

Yet, when people learn to stay in the "now" they claim it is just the end all of all end alls.

Is there an evolutionary plus for not staying in the "now?"

[BlueEyedSon]

1. Reflection is good. Planning is good too. Probably a slight advantage.

OTOH, if you are thinking about last week's hunt or which path you will take to fetch water tomorrow WHILE being attacked by a puma.... not so much.

[leftyladyfrommo]

2. So there is no way to "plan" if you stay in the "now."

That is a good point.

No way to play with ideas. You would just always stay in the now and not ever move beyond the present.

[BlueEyedSon]

3. Life is about balance. Work/play, being the the "now", not... etc

[BoneDaddy]

4. Now

I don't think there is an "evolutionary" reason we no longer stay in the now. I think it has much to do with out disconnection from ourselves, others around us and life in general but this is more a reflection of our technological, non-organic lifestyles than any kind of biological or evolutionary leap. This is a cultural issue.

Linking socio-paths who may happen to live in the "now" to meditation is like linking the dark machinations of the Bush cabal to intelligence. Just because they exist in the "now" does not devalue the importance existing in the present moment.

Living in the "now" does not mean simply living every second based upon what you want or desire, but means that we are conscious and mindful of every act and the intention behind it. Most people are moving within the ratrace, never truly looking deeply at what they are doing or being aware. They either are living in the past or are projectiing into the future.

Detractors of meditation or eastern concepts often try to criticize the "now" as being led by animalistic desires, but it means just the opposite. Being in the now brings awareness to our thoughts, feelings and actions and the intention behind them.

[leftyladyfrommo]

6. One good thing about the "now" is that

it is a good place to stay when things get rough. It makes it much easier to make it through the tough times in life.

I'm not against the concept - I just wonder about it's value sometimes.

And I was surprised to find that sociopaths stay there most of the time.

It's just an interesting question.

[Desertrose]

12. The "Now" is the only thing we have any control over really..

I agree with you post Bone Daddy, I think that we are so caught up in the illusion of linear time in our current society that most spend little time in the "now" or just "being". Its worry about the future or what happened in the past...

But when you think about it, what else is there really but being in the moment - whether we consciously put ourselves there or spend time thinking ahead or "remembering" the past, we are only living this life one moment of the "now" at a time. This "now" is the only place we can truly occupy ...and therefore is also the only point in time we can change or create things differently.

"Living in the "now" does not mean simply living every second based upon what you want or desire, but means that we are conscious and mindful of every act and the intention behind it."

I agree completely with this. Living "in the moment" or "now", is not about not thinking, it is about clarity of what & why you're thinking what you're thinking.

"Being in the now brings awareness to our thoughts, feelings and actions and the intention behind them. "

DR

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

5. A Sufi perspective

as I understand our teachings, the reason we don't stay in the Now is so that God can experience God-that the past/future orientation is yet another way the One can experience the One.

[FormerDittoHead]

7. I don't think you get "it"...

I honestly don't know if it's POSSIBLE to constantly live in the "now" but the point is to raise ones awareness above the level of all the things which we have learned to automatically respond to and view those responses in ourselves along with the reality of the current moment to make our living "real time".

Living in the now doesn't divorce you from your experience and other thoughts. It frees you from becoming a creature who only knows how to deal with reality through the lens of that experience. The result is to be able to look upon every thing with the ability to freely choose your actions, rather than simply using your trained reflexes or thought patterns.

A crucial part of such "now" training is a period of pure isolation and conscience slow movement. (huh?) The exercise sometimes referred to as "the desert", forces one to realize all of the things which we do out of pure reflex & response. I did it for two days and it was excruciating.

Your observation about evolution is a good one, however - for practically we can not AFFORD to constantly live in the "now" - we have things to do and we don't have the time to constantly think about how we're holding our wrists while typing, or our posture, or if we move our head back and forth while reading for example, we just do them.

But the point is to bring yourself back to the point where we learned to do such basic things (and more advanced things) and to teach us that we have free will to do anything - that we're NOT a product of our culture, society, etc. - that we CAN change.

[leftyladyfrommo]

8. Well, I tend to question a lot of things that mystics take for

granted. Because I am a mystic.

Like the state of bliss. I wonder if it is not just some mental state that one can induce. And it feels so good that people want to stay there. But that doesn't mean it is the end of the search. It might be that it is just one more diversion that one needs to move on through. It is simply another illusion.

[Arianrhod]

13. I agree.

Mental states are simply mental states, regardless of how transcendental they may appear. But there is another--much odder--quality to them.

Standing in the presence of someone who has achieved such transcendence has a notable effect on one. It's almost as if one's mind is drawn into the other's, so that one is experiencing that same transcendental state as s/he is. It can be an astounding thing.

Can the mind affect the energy surrounding it in the environment? My own answer to that question is "Yes", although I understand that I'm in a minority opinion on the matter. Personally, I think it has something to do with Quantum Mechanics.

I admit to the Bootstrap quality of this, but I can't do anything about it. :)

[Silent3]

9. I always stay in the Tuesday

You can find a little bit of Tuesday in every moment. Focus on a moment, be it the now, the past, the present. Let your feelings guide you to the Tuesday contained in all moments.

You will feel your negative auras transformed into positive auras. Your chakras will align. Your innate psychic abilities will be awakened. Your inner child will be able to beat the crap out of your boss's inner bully child. All will become peace.

[leftyladyfrommo]

10. Tuesday's child is full of Grace

Might as well stay there as anywhere.

[Arianrhod]

11. I don't think we ever experience the "Now".

Whether we are in meditation, contemplation, Rolfing, or great sex. :)

It is pretty much an established fact in neuroscience, after 20 years of research on the subject, that human consciousness lags behind reality by about 150-250 milliseconds (that's a quarter of a second). It takes that long for a stimulus--whether from outside the body or inside--to transfer from unconscious processes to conscious ones. Hence, we never perceive the "now", but rather create it from these processes to form what Nobel Laureate Gerald Edelman calls "present memory".

Our lives are literally lived unconsciously.

Personally, I think it is these unconscious processes that we tap into in deep meditation, producing in us the illusion of an Eternal Present that doesn't actually exist.

As to our staying in the future, I think that's largely a cultural thing. Our ego fear of nonexistence compels us to plan for long, lavish futures, and to try to work out in advance every possible obstacle to obtaining such a future. The mystical religions all teach us that this viewpoint is illusory, and impossible to realize anyway. Losing one's fear of death takes away a lot of "future" anxiety. :)

[Desertrose]

14. If you believe that life is lived only in the brain....

"It is pretty much an established fact in neuroscience, after 20 years of research on the subject, that human consciousness lags behind reality by about 150-250 milliseconds (that's a quarter of a second)."

If "life" is not lived in the physical brain but someplace else...some other unmeasurable or undefinable place, then maybe where we "really" live the "now" is just some fertile field where we create the illusion of this world where we measure things in nanoseconds and centuries?


DR

[Arianrhod]

15. You are very close to describing what I believe there.

I am a Pagan Gnostic, and as such I view the Universe as a Dream. Not our dream, but one in which we are integral parts. The laws of physics are the stuff of the Dream, but they are no more "real" than the rules that are defined in the algorithms of a computer. Thus, we are subject to these laws, but--as Morpheus says in The Matrix--we can also bend them.

We bend them all the time, often without thinking about it.

Sir Roger Penrose, the eminent mathematician and collaborator with Stephen Hawking on black hole theory, posits a realm similar to what Plato called The Ideal, in which all of the perfection of the Universe resides. He asserts in The Emperor's New Mind his belief in our ability to tap into this realm and view perfection directly. I would place the Dreamer in this realm--although, unlike most Gnostics, I'm not much of a Platonist.

So one might say that our true lives are actually lived in the mind of the Dreamer, who has concocted this world unconsciously and outside of his/her/its own volition, and that the goal of our existence is to return to that Mind that is the Universe.

This is the Gnostic viewpoint. It is radical, and I don't expect many people to accept it. . . .

[Desertrose]

16. Very cool...

I am familiar with it....and doesn't seem particularly radical to me ...actually I've probably have read a lot MORE radical stuff :evilgrin:

DR

[Arianrhod]

17. "I probably have read a lot MORE radical stuff" -- hahaha

So have I. :)

[Lydia Leftcoast]

18. To me, staying in the "Now" means not brooding about past suffering or

getting lost in fantasizing about a future that may never happen but paying full attention to what's going on in your life currently. Who knows? If you're really paying attention, you may discover wonderful opportunities (of every sort) that you might have overlooked if you were feeling sorry for yourself or dreaming about winning Powerball.

(Addendum: Sure, you remember your past, and you make plans for the future. You can't avoid it. But too much emphasis on either is crippling.)