The Wisdom of a Fictional Dog Mixed with a Jedi Master - Being Present

So I wonder if the universe if trying to send me a message...this today from our Thoughts of Dog page-a-day calendar

This was followed by reading my daily email from The Enneagram Institute which said:

Remember, when you are Present you place your attention on what is occurring now all around you, not focused on past, present, or future. Be aware of this today.

And of course, I continue with my photos for the year that I referenced in my last post which are really about being present...here are the latest ones...

I was in one of our small groups this afternoon and I started our time by sharing this photo of a soap bubble from the other night (when it was about 10 degrees outside).

This was a macro photograph of a bubble that was only about 1” in diameter (the light is shining in from a flashlight off to the side).  Those patterns aren’t seen unless you slow down and get close.  One of the participants said they looked like fern leaves in winter (which they do...fractals at work).  This led to us sharing about being attentive and present to the world around us and talking about how to live beyond just going through our lives on auto-pilot.  As we talked, it reminded me of a photo from a few mornings ago.

I saw this a few hours before I visited the hospital to pray with a congregant who was in his final hours.  He had told his family that he was ready to go and I blessed his life and blessed his transition from this life to the next.  After I left the hospital, I sent this photo to his daughter noting that it spoke to me of how we can find God in even the most unexpected of places - a break in the sidewalk that looks like a heart where a few tiny twigs fell to make a cross (or two depending on how close you look) or in a hospital room with a dear man in his final hours of his long and faithful life.  Again, it is being present to the moment.

This is not the easiest thing for me.  I’m one of those people who always has about five parallel things going on at the same time.  There’s a bit of a perpetual clock running in my head of when I need to wrap something up so I can be on time for the next thing.  It is a struggle for me to simply be present and to simply be in a moment rather than thinking of what’s ahead or going back to what has been.  I know he was talking to Luke, but Jedi Master Yoda could have been talking to me as well when he said...

All his life has he looked away...to the future, to the horizon. Never his mind on where he was. Hmm?  What he was doing.

I think that this might be the thing that the Spirit is speaking to me for the year ahead or at least for the right now.  Be present...or at least try to do so.  And even as I type that, another Yoda quote comes to mind...

Do or do not!  There is no try...

A few more photos from the week...

GPLJ,
Ed