I watched a YouTube video last night, a cartoon illustration of an Alan Watts talk.
He illustrated the meaning of “the present” by striking a gong.
He described exactly how I view myself in the world: a giant hourglass bringing the future to me, through the bottleneck of the present, which then produces the past.
I had a weird sensation when he struck the gong, and let it reverberate until the sound disappeared. I experienced, indeed, the present. All I did was listen to how the sound changed.
How do I stay there? How do I live in the experience of the resonating gong? That’s all there is, so why do I go elsewhere? How do I ignore (well, not ignore, but see the concepts for what they are) past and future?
The yearning this has created in me is startling.