Now and the Future

It’s easy to see that what we do today is creating our future. How else will we get where we want to go?

Since the only time we can take action is now, everything is really about the immediate moment.

We can take action in the present and have a sense, however clear or hazy, of where we want to go. The more we sense that today’s actions are leading toward a future we want, the more creative and productive we feel.

Radio host and psychic Hollis Polk recently pointed out a useful distinction in thinking about the present and the future. She said that sometimes we have a long-term goal that conflicts with our short-term reality. There may be times that NOT taking a step is a better choice, when other priorities are more important.

Wow. Do you, like me, criticize yourself for not achieving all your goals at once? I value my strategy of taking small steps toward major goals, and being consistent, so that I will reach the end. I have been revising our book, Smart Work, it seems for a long time now.

The most recent step has been to ask for feedback from readers. While that happens, I am not working on the book as consistently as I was. In the short term, this allows me to get some other projects under way. It also gives me a chance to return to editing the book with new perspective. I hope the product will be much improved.

With Hollis’s suggestion of separating the long-term goal and the immediate priorities, it’s easier to hush the internal nagging. In the bigger picture, progress is being made.

There are plenty of things I can do today that also lead to my long-term goals. One of them is to bring more clarity to what else I want to have in play when the book comes out.

Most readers of this column will recognize that inner push to achieve that can get us overly focused on a particular outcome. Even if I am not procrastinating, there is more to do than I have time for. It can feel like constant pressure. None of my tasks is more fun or comes out better because I am under pressure.

If I stop to breathe, feel gratitude in the present moment, and reflect on the bigger picture of who I am and what I want to do, I am getting somewhere too.

Remember that the connection between the short-term and the long-term does not have to be linear.
Enjoy your summer!