My Yoga instructor (Okay don’t laugh. Its assisted Thai Yoga that helps one my age and size stretch) reminds me that meditation every morning keeps one centered. She says concentrate on your breathing it will bring you back from things in your past and in your future.
It reminds me of the Centering Prayer program at St. John’s. Again, concentrating on the moment. It also reminds me of a tennis instructor who teaches his pupils to hit and return to center, hit and return to center. The purpose being prepared for the next shot, not the last one the pupil just hit.
All of this has a point. Whether it is in meditation, sports, prayer, or life we deal with each of them better if we are centered in the present. Yes, we have consequences for our past actions, and yes we must prepare for the future, (remember the fable of the ant and the grasshopper), but we are absolutely best served if we concentrate on the moment, centered on the present.
Easier said than done — just like not straying during meditation or prayer, not returning to center in tennis, and not opening up one’s hips during yoga.
Maybe one’s chant should be “center.”
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