07 Apr The Static in Your Head – April 8 2021
“It’s the thing that everyone struggles with all of the time, that idea of not having the day stolen from you by the static in your head, either regret for yesterday or fear for tomorrow,” he said. “And I’ve struggled with that like everybody else, and I have been for the last few years actively trying to resist it.”
Mr. Nighy said he has gone so far as to stand still in the middle of busy streets or lie under trees in London squares, simply trying to “relish the moment I’m in.”
“When you get to my age, you look at the clock, and you think: I better pay attention,” he said. “And why not try and have an active search for beauty wherever you might be? That’s the quest.”
from the article,
The Light Touch of Sure Hands:
Richard Curtis and Bill Nighy Reunite in ‘About Time,’
The New York Times, Sunday October 27, 2013
It’s really as simple as this. “…actively trying to resist” having the day stolen by the static in your head.
When we insist on identifying as the mind, we live in our thoughts, trying to solve the ‘problem’ of our unhappiness. ‘If I just think this through one more time, I’ll figure it out.’ This in spite of the fact that never in our history have we ever figured anything out. We’ve never been able to go back and change the past, keep our self from saying what we wish we hadn’t said, or able to say the thing we wish we would have said; nor have we ever been able to think through every possible scenario of our future to remove all chance of adversity.
What we are able to do is to get present, be in the world, present to what’s happening, present to our self, available to be inspired and prepared to give our all.
This is the way the world works and the way we work in the world–in the here and now. Never are we anywhere other than here nor any time other than now. Our speculating mind will always have us looking elsewhere for our happiness, yet happiness–indeed life itself–is available to us only in the moment. All we have to do is to choose it, again and again and again and again.
Today I will choose, whenever I can remember, to let the fears and regrets in my mind take care of themselves so that I may get busy with the business of living. I will put my attention on something here and now, rather than on my thinking.
