I know how wrong I’ve been. My eyes have focused way too much on the future, on the area of my headlights. Even now, my day often lurches to a start that relies on knowing my plans for the day. I am astonished how much of my energy has been focused on the “future” of a moment, on making permanent an event when “now” is the only thing within my grasp.
Even as I look back, I often notice regrets arising that I allowed experiences or relationships to diminish when they might have continued for “a long time”. I wonder how much I have missed because I was concerned about where things would lead, what the future would be like.
My mistake has been wanting things to last so intensely that I may have failed to grasp what was actually going on at the time. I know there have been times the doors of my heart strained to open, but I was cautious because permanence was so unclear, so unsure, so out of range.
As someone with traits of Aspergers, I naturally love the feeling that comes with trains. When I see railroads, I know with all my being “where this train is going.” The comforting roots of this assurance go deep. Perhaps that is part of my wanting things to last, of knowing where the day will go.
Planning is one thing. Taking deep assurance and identifying with the plan is something else.
I am a creature of my culture where promising a future is commonplace. Love is only “true love” if it is forever and part of a commitment. Even my teacher Thich Nhat Hanh, says so. Coupling in marriage, in an exclusive relationship, is ideal and the norm. In an attempt to see the future clearly, the reality of now typically becomes blurred.
Wanting the good experience of the now to go on and on is a distraction and a detour from insight. It is as powerful and as wrong as wanting something unpleasant to go away. It is this kind of grasping that leads to suffering. It is as powerful and in error as much as fear.
It is not my intent to seize the future when the real joy is in the present, in the now. I do not want to repeat the error of my past and my culture by wanting the pleasant moment to continue so strongly that I am less able to plunge into the enjoyment in my grasp.
This is for me a reliable source of glee. It is what gives me the most insight and joy.