People don't realize that now is all there ever is; there is no past or future except as memory or anticipatio... — Eckhart Tolle

People don't realize that now is all there ever is; there is no past or future except as memory or anticipation in your mind.

Author: Eckhart Tolle

Insight: We spend so much energy haunting our own lives—replaying conversations from last week, catastrophizing about next month—that we almost forget we're only ever actually living right now. The past exists as a story we tell ourselves, colored by how we felt then and how we feel now. The future is pure speculation. Yet we treat these mental constructs as more real than the ground beneath our feet, the person in front of us, or the work actually on our desk. What's tricky is that this isn't really a call to ignore consequences or stop planning. It's something stranger: the people who seem most effective at actually getting things done often have a clearer relationship with the present moment. They plan for the future, sure, but they're not lost in it. They learn from the past without being trapped there. There's a freedom that comes from recognizing that your anxiety about tomorrow is happening right now, in your body, stealing your attention from what you can actually influence. The radical part isn't mystical—it's almost mundane once you notice it. Every single moment of your life, when you're truly aware, feels like now. Even when you're remembering or planning, that thinking is occurring in the present. You can't step outside the now to fix it or escape it. You can only be in it, or not.

Source: The Power of Now, p. 32, 1997