Wallace & Portia

OK, so here's the thing. No matter who I read, they all say the same thing. It's just regurgitated with a few new phrases for the same things thrown in. I'm serious. Read a few books about life in the Now. Being Present. Whatever you wish to call it... I'm telling you, it's all the same.

But maybe there's a good reason for that.

Maybe it's because, as my Dad likes to say and probably several hundred self-help books, the present is all we've got.

I'm down with that. Especially the "not-over-thinking-everything" thing.

Like this past weekend at the beach. Body surfing in a strong current means a) great waves and b) the distinct possibility of drowning in an undertow. You have to pay attention. You have to focus on the job, or in this case the play, at hand.

I was in the Present Moment. It was all surf and salt air and feeling for the tide and seeing the dragonflies every where. It was the cold water of the deeper ocean mingling in with the warmer waters of the shoreline. It was being turned ass over tea kettle in the crashing waves and tossed up against the shrapnel of razor-sharp shells that covered the coastline. I came up for air with scratches, the odd bruise and the exhilaration of feeling Alive.

When you can be that focused, you can't think about anything else. None of the things that plague your mind during the hours of your "regular" life... things like career, living up to your potential, your choice of a mate or lack of a mate, your bad haircut, wondering if you should've been a doctor, afterall. Stuff like that.

So, maybe all these people have to tell you the same thing over and over because we just don't hear what is said. Yet, we still have the desire or need to reach that place of peace.

I found it at the beach last weekend, but I would guess, if all these self-help gurus are correct, that you can find it anywhere you happen to be. It's a choice. It's a place you go in your head and heart.

I'm going to try it more often. If you do, way to go. Good luck with that.