“Yesterday is a memory, Tomorrow is unknown. Now is the Knowing”

These are the words of Ajahn Sumedho the abbot of Amaravati Buddhist Center that he gave during a talk. What he meant by this is that our memories are often full of regret and criticism and our projection of the future can be full of fear of the unknown and anxiety but the present moment is all that we can really know.

It’s close on forty years since I walked into a beginners meditation class at a newly established Buddhist monastery. It was Friday night in August 1985. Sitting rather awkwardly in front to an orange robed, shaven headed monk wondering what would happen. We sat on the cushions on the floor, a mixed bunch of interested folk and listened. the monk in question, who later became my mentor, was Ajahn Santa Citto and was from the Bronx in the USA but had ordained twenty years before in Thailand. He began with the apparently simple practise of guiding us in a mediation that is known as the mindfulness of breathing or in the Pali language as Anapanasati. This is a practise to calm the mind and the form of meditation taught was to simply be aware of the inward and outward flow of your own breath. While it is simple to explain it is anything but simple to sustain. The mind simply goes off “Walkabout” and finds something much more interesting and fascinating to entertain itself with. I speak of the mind as something “other ” and it does seem, at times, as though it has its own agenda but persistence pays off and as I practised over the succeeding months and years I found that a quietness and clarity became apparent.

But this type of practice has its drawbacks, it can become very goal orientated and competitive with itself and can lead to staleness. After practising for some months I was encouraged to simply watch my thought processes as they passed through my inner field of view. With this practise the challenge is to not engage but just to witness these thoughts.

It is simply about paying attention.

But how to find these moments of presence in the daily turmoil of life? Over the last few years I have increasingly been using my physical senses. We are sensitive beings, we have sight, hearing, taste, touch and smell and recently as I walked up my garden for my morning ritual of bathing in the river I was assailed with a scent, something aromatic and wonderful and I was conscious in that moment of being right there with that experience. So try it yourself, really smell something and as you breath in that odour just be truly aware of that moment.

Share your experience with me if you wish.