This past week, during yoga practice, I focused on “staying in the present moment” and asked myself and my students to notice what makes our mind stray from absorbing everything that is happening right at this moment. Is it when a pose becomes uncomfortable, maybe when we become bored, maybe because we feel guilty for taking the time out of our busy day when so much needs to be done, maybe because we begin to judge the music, the space, the people or ourselves. So many possibilities nestled in the actuality of the moment that we too often ignore.

This poem read on the Writer’s Almanac this morning beautifully sums up the gratitude of living, owning and flowing in the moment. [replace the gendered language to suit you as you read].

Happy the man, and happy he alone,
He who can call today his own:
He who, secure within, can say,
Tomorrow do thy worst, for I have lived today.
Be fair or foul or rain or shine
The joys I have possessed, in spite of fate, are mine.
Not Heaven itself upon the past has power,
But what has been, has been, and I have had my hour.