The Present Moment || Podcast (Episode 4) || Ishan Shivanand

Welcome everyone. Uh, today's episode, we're going to be focusing on living in the present moment. Many times we find ourselves focusing on how the past has hurt us or impacted us deeply, or what the future holds, but we're never living in the now. To show our listeners what this looks like, Ishaanji, What does it mean to be living in the present moment?

Living in the present moment is observation without prejudice. Living in the present moment is allowing yourself to move towards your goal by being the best version of yourself and in alignment with that best version. Being in the present moment is having access to who you are. Now we have to understand this, this term present moment has captured the popular culture's imagination. Terms like here and now, where do these terms come from? To understand these terms, we have to take a deep dive into Eastern theology. There we will find there are three great religions: Buddhism, Jainism, and Sanatan. In Buddhism, Buddha talked about Jatak Kathay and in the Jataka Katha, he would talk about all the past life that he had lived and before he became Buddha. Those issues of the past life that were remaining, he had to resolve them. Then we have Jainism. In Jainism, we have Tirthankars, enlightened beings like Mahavir, and he also talks about Jatismaran. And Jatismaran just is that if you wanted to go ahead, you cannot go ahead if the past is pulling you back. So Jatismaran would be going deep down into your subconscious, looking at every unresolved issue that we have, every pain and suffering that is a residue of the life that we have lived, and in the words of Princess Elsa from Frozen, letting it go. The same is with Sanatana Dharma. Sanatana also talked about that if you have an objective, if you want to reach anywhere, But if you are burdened by your karma, then it is very, very difficult to reach to that objective because that karma is pulling you back. Imagine we are in a car and we want to go somewhere, and the GPS that's in our car is giving us wrong directions. The same Sanatana talked about that if you reach places you don't want to be, then rather than crying, look deep down into your gyanma ekosh, subconscious, and look at your belief systems. What are the belief systems that are making you choose the path that you choose? And all these three great religions, these three great theologies say that it is only through meditation, contemplation, that we can start to go inwards and we can start to then resolve the past, let it go, and be truly present. Let me define it for you in the most easy manner that I can. Before we begin the podcast, you and I were chit-chatting on what you were drinking and what I am drinking. I am drinking a black color liquid which is diuretic, known popularly as coffee. Now, if I drink a liter of coffee Then eventually, within 20 minutes, I would have a great desire to use the toilet. At that moment, when I am almost ready to burst, ready to go to the toilet, somebody comes to me and says, I want to discuss with you great wisdom. I love you. And I want to talk to you. Do you think I will have the sensibility to talk to that person even if I have a great desire to listen to them? No. My bladder is about to burst. I will be jumping, and even if I force myself to be in that situation, the only thing going on in my mind would be pee pee pee pee pee pee. At that moment, if I want to be in the present moment, I must allow myself the time to run to the washroom, let go of the unnecessary burden that I'm carrying, and the moment I let it go, I'll feel joy, I'll be in the present moment, and I'll be happy. The trouble that comes in popular culture is People force themselves, say that they want to be in the present moment without doing the homework of pulling the arrows, the emotional arrows, from this war-ravaged body and mind, from the wars and the past that we have lived. And then I will say I cannot meditate. I cannot meditate because I am pushing myself to be in the present moment without working on resolving the issues and without letting go. Being in the present moment comes automatically once I release and I derive freedom from the past.

I loved your analogy of using arrows to describe what we've gone through. And unless we're able to take those away for a minute and just take the time to focus on who we are, we're not able to move past in a healthy way that we're able to actually live in the present moment. A lot of people might think that living in the present moment may not necessarily matter because we're living for the future. Why does it matter that we focus on the present?

There may not be a future. There is no guarantee for a future. I was reading about this Greek philosopher who did something naughty, and he was about to be hanged for it. And just before he was being hanged, He was reading a book. So the people who were in the jail, they asked him, why are you reading a book 5 hours before you are being hung? And he said, for the same reason I read a book 50 years before I was about to die. The only difference now is I know I I am about to die, but does it mean that I stop living? When people say I will live for a future, they are procrastinating life. And we saw this many times when we do our research in mental health, because the thought process is that if I achieve something then happiness will come. If I acquire something, then joy will come, then self-respect will come, not realizing that my emotions, my thoughts, my mind does not rely on any external factor. If it did, then I can give you countless examples of people who are where you want to be, but they do not feel what you are aspiring to feel. That is why everybody is just running, because each time they get where they wanted to be, to feel what they wanted to feel, because they are not feeling it. Then they run a little bit more. We think if we have one car, we will feel happy. We get one car, happiness eludes us. So we think, maybe if we have two cars, maybe if we have three cars. It's so interesting. There's this company that sells these cups, um, just those cups in which you can put coffee and you carry them around. And I will not name that company because I do not know the name of that company. I think probably Stanley Cup or something. And it's, it's a cup, and the company wasn't doing that great business. So the person who took control of that company thought that maybe rather than functionality, I focus on aesthetics. So what he tried to do was he started to create limited edition cups with limited edition colors— pink color, black color, red color. So people started to aspire to own every single color of that cup for 7 days of the week. But now he's making so many colors, so people are trying to aspire to have different colors for each day of the month. Then there'll be so many colors, and then the aspiration would be for each day of the year. Now, the cup job is still the same, to give water. But I am now imprinting that cup with something else, maybe some other fulfillment that I am going to get from that cup, which is not possible, because if I was going to get it from that cup, then one cup would have been enough, probably two. But if something is just making me repeat the action like an addict, then probably the fulfillment that I am looking for does not exist in that action. So we have to look inside and we have to realize that all that emotional fulfillment has to come from inside, and that journey is probably more important than anything else. And I have to make that effort today, because the future that I am thinking will happen, and in that future something will happen 'And then I will be happy.' There are so many variabilities in our plan. Now imagine, if we almost reach that destination, thinking we will be happy when we will reach, but destiny have other plans. Then we have worked so hard and not been happy one day. It is crazy. I, uh, used to live in Rajasthan in the desert. Rajasthan was the land of the Rajput kings, and the Rajput kings were fierce warriors, and they used to defend the country from invasion that would happen from Afghanistan, from the middle part of Asia. Now because of that, there were lots of wars that were fought in Rajasthan. The place where I lived was— it wasn't uncommon to listen to stories that when some construction was happening, they were digging, they found pots of silver or gold. Now why the pots of silver or gold? Because the wars would be happening, the invasion would be happening, so people would bury their treasure. And when they buried their treasure, then maybe they die during the war, or maybe they are old and they are thinking one day they will spend, and they die eventually. Or maybe they become old and senile and they forget that they buried their treasure. And so much buried treasure just because somebody thought there would be a good time to start living. They never got to live, but somebody else 300 years later Kaching! Became baller. So my request is to all the youth listening to me: you have been burying treasure in yourself all your life, waiting that one day, one day I will dig it up and I will live it. Treasures like, you know, we have these cells the self that loves. And we say, one day we will have that person in front of us, and, and we will love that person the way we really want to. And we've buried that person. We have a self inside us that is very happy, very joyous, ready to jump around and smile. We said, no, no, no, no, not now. One day, when we will be in a presumed safe place of our creation, then we will allow that self. We will dig it up, and we will let it be on that surface, and we have just buried it all, and we are living the life of a robot. And I am just saying to you, there is no guarantee for tomorrow. Start digging up your treasure and living in that present moment. Otherwise, what will happen is all our real treasures will be buried, and we will be running after fake treasures like the cup with different color and thinking that is happiness. But that is not happiness. If that was happiness, then why would the mental health graph of the collective consciousness of the world decreasing every single day? Because we are relying upon plastic treasure, and it is time to dig the real treasure.

The way that you described having treasure within ourselves is so beautiful and poetic because I think many youth struggle with realizing that they are such capable, strong, powerful human beings that have so much force of change and confidence in this world. How do we help our youth and empower them to help them focus on themselves and their admirable qualities and allow them to give the time to give gratitude to themselves or to those they love.

I am not the person who will help. I am just the person who can guide and inspire. There is a saying in the East: you become enlightened by not what you do in front of people. You become enlightened by what you do when you are alone in a room with yourself. Anybody can dance in a ballroom. It's so easy to wear a mask. You know, everybody wears a mask. I may be feeling like crap, but I wear a mask and I smile. Hehehe. I may be very angry at my boss, but I know I need my dollar dollar, so I'll, I'll laugh at his pathetic joke and give him mental punches. So I can be with you in public and I can guide you But in the end, there will be a time in your life when you will be alone in a room with yourself. And when you are alone in the room with yourself, if you like yourself, if you love yourself, if you accept yourself, then you will take action that I have guided you, or people like me have guided you towards. Or if there is some place where unresolved issue with the self exists, then that time when we are alone with ourselves, we will use it to numb ourselves away from ourselves. And that numbing behavior could be doom scrolling on the phone, that numbing behavior could be ordering unnecessary things from DoorDash. That numbing behavior could be addiction. That numbing behavior could be anything where I am just trying to drown myself in sensory stimulus. And if at that time I have the thought somebody will come and help me, that superhero never comes. Superhero in leotards are just in movies. Why society has been mesmerized by the concept of superheroes today, especially. We have never lived in such a time where every single movie and popular culture reference is a superhero, because there is this subconscious desire: somebody will come and save me, somebody will come and save— nobody comes, nobody comes. All the people that I mentioned, the Tirthankars, the Buddha, the Mahavir, they were alone in the forest. With themselves. And I have to realize this: I am the creator of my destiny, I am the one responsible for my destiny, and I have to be my own superhero. But for that, I have to have this care and this love for myself. Whenever Lex Luthor throws— what is Superman's girlfriend's name? I forget. But yes, Superman has a girlfriend who is always being thrown from the skyscraper, and every time she is thrown— I, I don't know. If anybody knows, please write in the comment section. And if you are going to the comment section, please like and subscribe our channel. So is it Katy Perry? No, I don't know. So whenever Superman's girlfriend is thrown, Superman runs away from being Clark Kent and shoom, saves his girlfriend because he loves his girlfriend. If you are Superman and you don't love yourself, then your inner demon will throw you into the darkness and you are falling, but the inner Superman is busy on the phone. So our self is falling, falling in the darkness and touch on the ground while we are busy on the phone. So we have to develop that love, that care for ourselves. We have to teach ourselves that we matter. We are the creator of our destiny. We are the one who is responsible for that destiny. But more than anything else, we deserve a divine destiny. This self-worth, this self-worth, nobody can teach you. You have to develop yourself that I deserve the best of health, I deserve the best of thought, I deserve the best of emotion. If I have that thought, then I will go around in the world and seek out people like me. Who can again guide you, teach you. But if my emotion is going to be that people like me will help, they are the ones who have the power to help, then I will develop a toxic relationship with self-help teachers, with therapists, with anybody who I project is going to be my helper. So I have to realize that those people out there, they are there to guide me, yes, help me till some extent, yes, but the final strength, it is only I. I am my own superhero. And that's why the whole concept of present moment When I am falling in that darkness that lies in my mind, then in that present moment lies a hero in me waiting to help. And the more I come to the present moment, the more there are chances of me saving myself from myself.

On a final note, are you able to share a time or just an example where you were your own superhero?

Sure. I'm just going through all the mental memories that, that I have, and For me, the most powerful incident was that made me push myself. So I come from a tradition of the guru culture. So in the guru culture, you are raised in a monastery, and it's like the military, the army. There's a head monk who tells you what to do. And you train yourself to listen. You train yourself to shut up and listen. And the whole point of that training is, if he says run, you don't ask why. You ask how far. Exactly like basic training in the military. And I lived like that for almost the age of 25. And it is a very safe feeling, very good feeling, because then I don't have to think. There's somebody to tell me what to do, what to feel. There's somebody to tell me take left, take right. So you're happy, you know, you're happy, happy in that feeling of safety. And then At a certain age, my Guru, my— the head monk, he told me, 'I am taking Sannyas.' And Maha Sannyas is the point where the head monk just retreats onto himself, just cut ties with anything that is worldly. Imagine no care of food, of what to wear, just sitting in a corner meditating and cutting the last ties towards civilization. And when he said that, suddenly I was in a state of shock. If you go into Mahasannyas, who will take care of me? You know, this is this pain that comes, and it's like losing a parent. When we cry when someone dies, yes, we are crying that they are dead, but somewhere that crying is also because now who do I have? What about me? Me, it's always about me. So I looked at him and I said, "What about my teaching, my education?" And he said, "I taught you whatever I could. Now it's up to you." And I said, "What about all the tasks that we were doing?" And he said, "Finish them." I said, "What about all the objectives?" He said, "You are on your own." So that time, suddenly, when I had nobody to hold my hand, I stumbled hard. Fell face first. Splat! And I was just literally emotionally in a fetal position, rocking myself in a place of darkness, forgetting everything. And that happens, that happens when an incident like this comes in your life. You are like a deer, panicked, frozen in headlights. Blinded. And that happened, the state of shock. And I was in that state of shock for a long time, where I was frozen, panicked. I, I knew a lot of things. This is again, I will give the analogy of a soldier. A soldier goes through basic training, but suddenly when war happens then the first thought is being frozen: 'What is happening around me?' And the same happened with me. I was just frozen. I didn't know what to do. I didn't know how to complete the task. I did not know how to walk. I had forgotten everything. And in my mind, I was sad and depressed because I was hoping that he will come back, that he will see that I am incapable, and he will come back from his Mahasannyas, and he will hold my hand, and things will be back to the way they were. And I was hoping for that to happen. Things will be back to the way they were. And I waited, and I waited, and I waited, and I waited. And then things did not come to the way they were. So then the acceptance of the situation came after the denial. And after the acceptance, in myself I heard a voice that maybe I can 'Let me try.' So I tried walking, and when I tried walking, I saw I was capable. I tried to handle the projects of my guru, the head monk, and I saw myself succeeding. Now, all my life I had received that training. I had those wings. I never used them, but thanks to the head monk, I had them. And now when I could fly, I stretched the wings little bit more and I could fly a little bit more. And then I started more projects and more things started to happen the way I imagined they would. And then one day I went to see the head monk and he was meditating in Mahasannyas. And I just looked at him and I said, 'I I did it. And he just smiled and said, I know, now get lost. So I think that was the time when I became my own hero, and I was pushed, pushed to find that hero within me.

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