right here is where I am right now

I've had a number of conversations recently about living in the now. These conversations have peppered my path for a while now. I also have come across a quote that makes sense to me. In her book Dance of the Dissident Daughter, Sue Monk Kidd writes:

"In the trek across the gorge, we often scan about for shortcuts. During that period, I often wished some wise woman who'd been there before me whould appear and tell me how to zip through it. If she had, though, she probably would have admonished me to give up seeking a shortcut and just be where I was (emphasis mine).

There is deep wisdom in giving up the fight to make it go away. When we instead come home to our path, we come home to what is. You are where you are. So be there. Stop trying to protect yourself from the harshness of right now, fleeing into a long fabrication about how it's going to be one day. That's a way of avoiding the here-and-now truth of our lives." (p. 96)

I've got some places to walk in the next while where it is very tempting to engage in a fabrication about how it's going to be one day. My prayer for myself is to face the here-and-now truth of my life. For I believe there is deep and lasting freedom in the here-and-now places, if we are brave enough to stand in them.