you're in it.

I have been thinking a lot lately about the different mindsets people live with. Particularly about whether they live in the past, present, or future.

So much of the time people live in the past. They relive memories, nurse their grudges, and lick their wounds. I have been very guilty of this lately...I think about people in my past, and I wonder what went wrong. I try to figure it out and decide how I could have done things differently to get a different result. I wonder how our mutual past has affected them and if they ever think about the same things that I do...

But when living in the past becomes too painful, people often revert to instead dwelling on the future. They dream and plan their lives...imagine what they'll do when their lives finally begin, and stress about the idea that their lives never will begin. I am guilty of this as well. It eases my pain to think of how grand my life will be when I finally have a car...a new wardrobe...the perfect person for me to spend my time with.

I think dwelling mentally in the future is probably not as unhealthy as dwelling on the past...but I do think that there's a negative side to it.

I tend to dream about my life as it will one day be so much that I forget to enjoy my life as it is.

I watched 'P.S. - I Love You' today, and there's a line where the leading lady says to her husband, "I just get so scared sometimes that our life will never start!"

Her husband replies, "It's already started. We're in it. You've got to stop waiting, baby."

Later on, when he's gone, she misses that moment she had with him.

The irony of life is that we can miss a perfect moment from our past, but when that perfect moment was happening, we didn't realize it was perfect. In fact, during that perfect moment we were probably thinking about the future. Maybe we were even thinking, "I can't wait until I have more of what I have right now!"

We are determined to be constantly dissatisfied. The past was perfect...the future will be perfect...But we always despise the present.

I am trying to learn to 'be here now'. To live in the here and now; To make every moment its best, as cliche' as that may be.

But it's hard to find a good balance between living in the present and hoping for the future. I mean, we can make the present amazing, but we also want to make the future the best it can be. In order to do that we need to have some general goals. In order to make these goals, we have to dream a little...And we also have to let our goals and vision of the future influence the choices we make IN the present.

So how do you balance that?

I'm just tired of not enjoying my cup of coffee because I'm thinking about how great it will be when I can enjoy my cup of coffee in the autumn. Or not enjoying the friends I'm with because I miss my other friends. Or not feeling pretty NOW because I think I'll be prettier when I grow up.

I've finally realized that there's no great climax to life. No great spiritual or emotional crescendo will be reached because I've reached a goal. Even when I meet my goals, I'll have more goals. I'll have more problems to be solved. That's just how life is.

I think life is defined by those fleeting perfect moments rather than the great climax we're all waiting for...we just have to learn to really appreciate and live in this moments.

I've got to stop waiting for life to happen to me.

I just want to be here now.