The only thing I can ever know for certain is what I’m experiencing in this very moment. (Notice that I said “what I’m experiencing”, not “what’s happening”.) What I experienced in the previous moment is memory, and memory is faulty. What I’ll experience in the next moment hasn’t happened yet, so while I can predict – sometimes with accuracy – what will happen, I can’t really know for sure until the moment arrives.

This awareness has some interesting implications. To really understand this truth, to get in our bones, can be terrifying. If we don’t know what’s going to happen next, and we can’t be sure we remember exactly what happened in the past, it can feel like we don’t have much to hold on to. It can bring us smack in the face with our fears and doubts and uncertainties.

But this awareness can also be liberating; it can free us of our need for things to be a certain way. Rather than resting our reassurance on predictions of the future or detailed analyses of our past, we can have faith in our ability to respond to whatever arises from moment to moment. We can allow ourselves to see more clearly the multiple possibilities available in each moment.

It isn’t that we shouldn’t plan or anticipate; this is in our nature and it’s useful to do so. Rather, it’s about holding these plans and anticipations lightly, reminding ourselves that we may make plans, but we really do not know what’s going to happen until it happens.

When I think about this, I think about skiing. When a skiier starts off down the slope, she has some idea of what it will be like, based on past experience and her awareness of the conditions. But she can’t know for certain what will happen on this run until it happens. She relies on her skills, training, and past experience, but she has to stay aware of what’s happening in the moment so that she can respond to it.

Distraction has gotten a bad reputation among people who want to live more fully in the present moment. By definition, a distraction is anything that takes us away from the moment; it’s seemingly the antithesis of mindfulness.

But distractions are useful and necessary for those times when what’s happening in the moment is too overwhelming. Psychologist John Briere (www.johnbriere.com) tells us that distraction and other avoidance strategies are part of our natural, inborn system for processing traumatic memories. We have to be able to step away from painful memories and overwhelming emotional experiences in order to keep them workable, and distraction works very well in this regard.

The problem with distraction isn’t distraction per se. Rather, it’s the way we go about it. Our need for distraction can be so strong that often we do it automatically and unconsciously. Think about the last time you found yourself distracted. Chances are, you were spaced out and unaware of what you were doing; perhaps you suddenly found yourself in the mall handing your credit card to a cashier, or in front of the TV watching something you’ve seen a dozen times before, or diving into a big bowl of ice cream, or doing something else that you knew you’d later regret.

So what to do? Is there a way to mindfully engage in distraction? I believe there is, that we can train ourselves to engage in distraction deliberately and with intention. The next time you catch yourself engaging in distraction, just notice what you’re doing. See it as a sign that you’re feeling anxious or overwhelmed, and name this to yourself. Allow yourself to go ahead and eat the ice cream or watch the rerun, but be honest with yourself about what you’re doing, staying as aware as possible while you do it. As much as you can, be kind and understanding, rather than judging yourself. Over time, you can begin to be more conscious of your need for distraction and you can choose to engage in it consciously, rather than on auto-pilot.

Obviously, there are things some of us use to distract ourselves that can be harmful, such as abuse of alcohol and drugs. Becoming conscious of the times we need to be distracted and the things we choose to distract ourselves with puts us in a position where we can make better, healthier choices about the ways we take a break from painful experience.

I recently heard that one of the many effects of meditation practice is that, over time, you become increasingly aware of the shifting nature of experience from moment to moment, seeing for example how feelings of happiness and calm can pass away and feelings of agitation can arise in their wake. I’ve been noticing this constant, subtle shift in experience a lot lately. The other morning, I was delighted to discover that I was feeling calm and at peace for no apparent reason. I was just feeling happy. “How nice”, my mind said, “this is going to be a good day”. I knew I was setting myself up with a thought like that; I know better than to think that a mood state will last forever, or even all day. But my mind, like all minds, tries to hold on to the pleasant and push away the unpleasant, and this thought was a natural reaction to feeling happy. That morning, the unpleasant arrived soon enough: an hour or two later, I found myself feeling impatient and cranky. My mind immediately went to work, looking for a cause of this “bad” mood, quickly inventorying everything I’d consumed that day – “did I drink too much coffee?”; evaluating the places I’d been – “this is because I had to wait in a long line at the post office!”; berating myself for not just staying home, sitting in front of the fire curled up with a good book. “Next time”, my mind said, “I’ll do things differently. Next time, I’ll make this good mood last much longer”. Hah!

Our moment-to-moment experience is constantly shifting. Practicing meditation helps us see more clearly what’s going on in the mind, and we begin to catch these shifts as they happen rather than only noticing them when we experience a dramatic change in mood. Along with this awareness, we begin to see all the wacky things the mind does to hold on to what feels nice and reject what feels not so nice. I notice that when my mood feels pleasant, I project these feelings into the future, planning an entire day around my lovely state of mind. And then as the pleasant feelings subtly begin to subside, feelings of regret and frustration arise, and I have thoughts like, “oh, not this again!”, quickly followed by a reassuring voice telling me that I’ll feel happy again soon.

The more I watch this flow of experience unfold, the more aware I am of how quickly and how often these shifts occur. As much as my mind would love to have “a good day”, I’ve yet to experience a day that didn’t have some unpleasant experience passing through my mind. I guess what this all boils down to is this: there are no “good” days or “bad” days; they’re all just days, filled with experience, some of which is pleasant, and some of which is unpleasant. We can fight this stream of experience and make ourselves miserable in the process, or we can swim with the current and discover that it really is much easier to go with the flow.

Welcome to my weblog! My intention in creating this blog was to have a space where I could think out loud about issues and ideas that come up for me as I go about my daily life. Reflecting on my experience helps me understand more about what it is to be human, and I share these thoughts to you in the hope they spark an idea or give you a different perspective on yourself and your experience being in the world.