There are three things we often seem to have too little of: love, money, and time. I’ve spoken in great detail and for far too long about space and time, presence and occupying the moment. I’ve touched on love here and there, but virtually not at all on money. I’m going to keep that train going because I would rather talk about time. After all, it is where all things reside. 

I have several exciting projects coming your way, things that have me stoked for the future. I have, in the last few months, become incredibly busy. Whether that is a good or bad thing depends on the day and the reason. My life, like many twenty-somethings, is extremely transitory, and I live in this sort of elevator; this perceivable vessel of motion between one stage and another. 

As we go through this cosmic elevator suspended in time, I have become acutely aware of my widening sense that I have very little time after all. Time is filled with a number of projects, people, responsibilities, and circumstances which saturate my life and cost primarily an unrefundable currency called minutes, hours, and days. This year has gone by so quickly; today has too.

As I live in the elevator, I keep thinking about the next stage. When is it coming? When do I finally arrive? I am counting on the weekend, the next big enjoyable thing. I am zoning out the bad stuff, hoping my work days go quickly, shitty and insufferable conversations, frustrations, reminders of the differences between my elevator and the floor I want to get off on, go hastily by if I am only lucky. 

In all of this, I have managed to develop two counteracting problems: the first was that time was slipping away, and the second was that time wasn’t going fast enough. Like Goldilocks, I’m hard to please, I know. I began to recognize these problems were coexisting when I was trying to navigate my post-workday wind-down, and I felt that my evenings were far faster than my days. Too, I have noticed that I spend most of my uncomfortable moments seeking some reminder of its impermanence, waiting in some way for something to change my life. 

As someone with several years of therapy under my belt, I knew I had a toolkit of mindfulness practices, where I call attention to my surroundings, my life, my thoughts, feelings and bodily conditions. With this, I started with the first problem: time is slipping away. 

Mindfulness as a tool has been incredibly helpful for mending my relationship with time. It has been a practice that I rely on less in the form of hour-long sitting meditations and more on checking in with the here and now, wherever and whenever that may be. Becoming attuned with the moment you reside in has an interesting property that I can only call spacious. 

Our awareness of moments is like water to a sponge; it is a recipe for expansion. Not only is awareness set to acquire this expansiveness, but it is also a process of absorption. We do not sense the slowing of time because time actually slows down, but because the degree of information we take in is higher. We are closer to the moment, more privy to the moment’s full breadth and expression.

When practicing presence, the scope of our conscious awareness widens. There is richness, more detail. It is the difference between watching a movie in the background and being fully captivated by its story. If we aren’t paying attention, we’re bound to miss something. 

The movie in the background ends quickly, the time passes, and nothing is gained, but we are now at least one movie older. Instead, we may choose to watch the movie, take in the sights and scenery, each spoken word, or soundtrack, fully appreciated as it passes. We are still one movie older, but we were here for it; odds are it felt a little longer. 

This length again is not in reality longer, because time is unfortunately a very tricky thing, but our perception is changed. Our moment brought to its full potential by simply gazing our senses upon it. 

So this is the first half of my problem solved, and these practices are great to use when the moment is enjoyable enough to pay attention to. However, my other issue remains: my elevator is slow, the movie is boring, and I want this to end.

So, of course, the obvious solution is to check out, to disengage because we don’t want to actually be here anyway. Why would we open the door to presence? It would be silly to make this moment longer.

So this is where I’m struggling most, predominantly because my less satisfactory moments occupy a large part of my weeks and my days. I am stressed, and I resist their happenings as best as I can. I check my email, and I hope for a call to save me. Maybe today is the day. But each day I lie in wait from the present moment in hopes that I won’t have to experience it that deeply, perhaps that would be confirming my life is truly unfolding the way that it is.

Our aversion to presence is not simply a fear of our reality but of confirming the narratives we hold tightly with their confirmation. It will hurt too much to be there, it feels too shitty, too uncomfortable, and we’ll tell ourselves it will never end. If we do, maybe we will find that we deserve it. 

So there is this side where we are avoiding presence because the moment simply sucks. It is not enjoyable. The other side of the coin is where we are housing our stories. What is it beyond the discomfort that we are avoiding? For me, I am sure it involves my lack of imagination regarding my future and the persistence of my discomfort. I don’t want to tune into my life when it’s like this, especially if I’ll be doing that for as long as I live.

This choice is a tough one, and we must go about it carefully. Can we interrupt our discomfort, find presence in between? Can we reduce the sense that this is all going to shit by stepping back and gaining perspective from the space and time that we truly occupy? Can we slow down time and make it more enjoyable, richer even when it is hard? Do we even know how shitty it is when you get that close?

There is no real defining line for when to be present, except that it could probably be all the time. We have a greater capacity for meaning-making, problem-solving, and agency-using when we interrupt the autopilot and check in with ourselves and our lives. I’m not saying I am good at this; in fact, I think I’m saying I’m actually pretty shit at it, but I am also saying it is valuable, and I think I’m going to have to try.

So my two conflicting problems find the same solution, and that is bearing witness to the passage of time, however it may unfold. My worry of time slipping, an unconscious grip on the past, and my worry of time slowing, an unconscious fear of an unknown future, are met in the middle. Here, now. 

All of my worries, my resistances and conflicting beliefs dissolve when I get here, when I sit on the elevator and know still that I’m moving. But for now, I’m here, for better or worse, I can do what I want in this moment. Disconnection is too expensive, but being here, truly here, is just right. If I’m going to spend my time, I’m going to get my money's worth.