Take a moment before you read on; close your eyes or keep them open, fix your stare on something and ask yourself: “ What matters? “
Last week, a co-worker asked me this exact question. I was stumped, time stopped and for minutes I was just staring at my desk. Nicole, my friend and co-worker laughed as if she knew exactly what was going on in my head. It’s a loaded question and all my thoughts were jumbled searching for an answer as I thought about poverty, world peace, our current state of government, women’s rights, gender equality, educational institutions, family values, my family, forgiveness and so on.
As these fleeting thoughts passed through my mind, it dawned on me … what matters more than right now? The present moment? I blurted this out and Nicole smiled. That was the same answer she had come to while laying in bed the night before. “Lucky”, she said, “nothing matters except this moment. The past is gone and we’ve learned from it; we have no control over the future. Our choices right here and right now are all that matter.” Exactly!
As a facilitator for the international NGO, The Art of Living Foundation, I could not have explained it better. The mind has a tendency to vacillate between the past and the future. We are either worried about something that happened or about something that could “possibly-maybe-kind of” happen in the future. This vacillation is what causes our body to undergo what we know as stress. Don’t get me wrong, learning from the past is important and planning for our future is also essential, but that’s not what our mind does. It forces us to struggle with the guilt and anger of the past or get anxious and fearful about the future, thus losing out on the precious NOW.
So, how do we live in the present moment? The secret is in the breath! Our mind and breath have a unique connection, as do our emotions and breath. It is very difficult to control our mind and emotions at the level of the mind, but you can through the breath. The yogic science of breath is a precise 5000+ year old science of health promotion. It is one of the first sciences to recognize the impact of the mind and emotions on creating and restoring optimal health. The breath is the most under-utilized yet most effective tool we have to eliminate toxins.
A holistic approach to living life in the present moment and using the breath to do so was introduced to me through The Art of Living Foundation, the world’s largest volunteer-based humanitarian and educational organization in the world that is working towards creating a stress-free violence-free society. How? We offer a stress-management workshop called The Happiness Program.
The centrepiece of this program is a unique breathing technique called the Sudarshan Kriya which is a powerful rhythmic breathing technique that uses natural rhythms of the breath to get you unstuck, removing toxins at a cellular level. As we organize more Happiness Programs across Vancouver Island, we watch our students engage in experiencing the present moment and it is wonderful. Take a moment in your day, ask this question to someone you know and see what matters to them.
Lucky Sund
Art of Living Foundation
Facilitator
Email Lucky Sund
The Art of Living website
The Art of Living Research
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