In my world, my life has always been about the future. As I look around at the people in my life, I can bet that most of them feel the same way. Whether it's been about plans for the next day, hoping for the weekend or working towards my future career, I hardly ever focus my time and energy on today.
This isn't always bad. It is important to plan ahead, figure out what we want in life and put plans into action. However, when we focus only on the future, we can cause ourselves more stress, negativity and take away from the good things we experience every day. This is because we are trained to believe that the future is the most important aspect of our lives, and that is what we should constantly be working towards. While this is important, so is focusing our energy on everyday aspects of our lives.
One of the biggest roadblocks in this sense is that life does not always go as planned. I've always been told that it is important to be able to adjust to the things life throws at you. When we plan our future too much, we can lose sight of this and when life does throw roadblocks our way, it can seem like the entire plan is falling apart. In reality, it's usually a setback, one that can be overcome with the right attitude and an adjustment in our plan.
Another aspect of not focusing enough time on the present is that we often focus too much of it on the past. We dwell on mistakes we've made or simply get caught up in the past. This keeps us from moving forward and letting ourselves live and be happy in the present.
Most importantly, we fail to enjoy everything we have and get to experience every day. The people we get to spend time with, the everyday activities we actually enjoy, and each small victory is significant and should receive more of our attention.
So how do we work on this? The little, seemingly minor, everyday things.
This makes us more aware of everything we have, and it is important to be grateful for those things. While so many of us who are college students dread Mondays and count down the days 'till Friday, we can choose to be grateful to have the opportunity to be in school in the first place. The same thing applies to a work week. We can choose to notice the atmosphere and the people we get to be around. We can celebrate accomplishments like getting through a tough day or doing well on a particular task.
This positivity can, in turn, create a cycle of positivity, and can only benefit us in the long run. It is important that we start focusing on today because, as of right now, that is all we have control over. In addition, it is important to also truly enjoy today and the little things, because we never know when things are going to change, so why not enjoy it while we can?
As Mother Teresa once said, “Yesterday is gone, tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today, so let us begin.”
