Another experience I had on my recent trip to Canada touched me deeply, and reminded me of how moments of delight can shift into moments of unease and back again.  I spent a day canoeing on a small lake and thoroughly enjoyed soaking in the quiet that comes with only the sound of oars touching the water, along with honking geese and the flap of ospreys’ wings.  At the beginning of the canoe outing, I let myself sink into the experience of watching the underwater vegetation flow and move as the canoe passed through it.  I enjoyed watching the fish dart in and out of the vegetation, sometimes a solitary fish, sometimes lots of them going this way and that.  For quite a while, the ride was relaxed, with the only exertion coming from using the oar, which was a physical and psychological pleasure.  As I wasn’t steering, I sat at the front of the canoe and simply enjoyed working the oar and watching the lake slip by underneath the canoe.

My experience changed, however, when we came to a place in the lake where I noticed countless tree trunks, branches, and whole trees under the water.  It was very like moving into a tree graveyard, and I found myself filled with disquiet as the canoe passed over large, submerged tree trunks, trunks I knew were from mature, once-stately trees.  It seems that this whole section of the lake had been a woods or forest, and the trees had been chopped down before the area was filled with water.  This “tree graveyard” went on for quite a while and, as it was in a portion of the lake that wasn’t too deep, the trunks, branches, and whole trees were impossible to ignore.  Rather than fight the disquiet I felt, I sank into it and allowed myself to feel the full measure of my sadness that these trees were sacrificed for the lake.  Almost immediately, though, I also realized that the lake now gives life to many birds, including heron, loons, cormorants, ospreys, geese, fish, and other wildlife that wasn’t there before it was created.

Then, we moved on into other parts of the lake where there weren’t submerged trees, and I again connected with the quiet and serenity of the place.  I gave myself to that experience, as well, noticing how much better it was for me not to become wedded to any particular state of mind but, instead, to notice what the present moment brought and to become fully engaged with whatever that moment contained.

All this brought to mind the ways in which nothing stays the same and how, when we’re living in the flow of the present moment, we benefit from being able to be with the flow rather than fighting against what it brings.  In years past, I would have stayed in my sorrow for the trees, making up stories about them that would have fed my emotional experience.  I could well have stayed in that place for the rest of the day.  What I know now is that, when I can just be with the “what is” of a moment, without making up a story about it, or dramatizing it, I’m more able to experience it fully and am then free to move on to what the next present moment brings.

For this week’s experiment, I invite you to notice how the present moment can bring a constantly changing array of experiences, which may elicit surprisingly disparate feelings from one moment to the next.  What starts out feeling good can turn into something uncomfortable and what starts out as a painful challenge can become something empowering and nourishing.  The key here is to keep moving into the present moment, rather than getting stuck on one that’s already become a past moment.  As you do this, notice your experience.  How is it different from when you become either stuck or wedded to a moment that is over?  Also, what resources and choices do you have available when you stay in the present moment that you lose when you are either focused on a past moment or on one that hasn’t yet happened?

As with all the experiments, please bring curiosity along as your constant companion, and be sure to leave any judgment way in the back seat of awareness.  The gift here is simply to notice what it’s like for you to choose to stay in the present moment.  It’s a big, constant choice, and not an easy one to make when the moment that just passed was upsetting or activating.  Be sure not to struggle with your experience.  Also, pay attention to whether or not you feed your connection with a past moment by continuing to obsess or worry about it.  What’s it like to let it go as something that has already come and gone and now there’s a brand new moment right here in front of you, and who knows what it will hold?   If you find yourself stuck on something that already happened, notice it as part of the present moment you’re experiencing and be compassionate with yourself.  We all get stuck at times, and that’s where the practice comes in.