Emerson once said that “We are always getting to live, but never living.” We know it’s important to enjoy the present since life’s short, and we never know what’ll happen tomorrow. After all, it’s only possible to live happily ever after on a moment-to-moment basis. If ‘now’ is what matters, do we need goals, plans, or a New Year resolution? I think there’s a role for them. They help us think about what things we want, why we want them, and how we can achieve them. They act as a guide and help us plan what to do in the present. What we do today will have an impact on our life in the future. And as long as we’re alive, tomorrow will arrive, and future will become present.
Life is about striving a balance: balance between now and future, planning and living, between time spent on my ambitions and time for other people, between working hard toward my goals and enjoying the moments, and between taking my dreams seriously and learning to laugh at myself. It’s also a balance between self-control and spontaneity, honesty and compassion, generosity and thriftiness, caution and boldness, and feeling and reason.
Some of them may not be compatible at the same time, but I believe they’re not incompatible. Balancing them and deciding when to focus on which in order to make life most enjoyable for both the present and the future is an art I’m learning about.
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