If you are depressed, you are living in the past. If you are anxious, you are living in the future. If you are at peace, you are living in the present.
– Lao Tzu
I am struggling right now with living in the future. The health of someone I love very much is declining rapidly and visibly. I see this person only a few times a year, and the difference between the last visit, in the fall, and this visit is startling and frightening. I can only envision this path continuing downhill to death, and I am frightened and angry at that prospect. Sharing my fear at a meeting has helped to lessen the anxiety, but it is still there. I know that death is inevitable, and I pray for acceptance of that fact. Perhaps more importantly, I must pray that I am ready when it does come. Only through acceptance and the help of my Higher Power can I return to living in the present. Only then will I again be at peace.
A meditation for December 27, 2012.
Warren Zevon singing Bob Dylan's Knocking on Heaven's Door. He was dying of cancer when he recorded the album, The Wind, on which it appears.