Where is the Manual??

She wonders where she can buy a copy of the “Learning How to live in the Moment” manual. Her very good friend Susan told her that it should come with the book on “Raising Children” …..You know, the one you’re supposed to get upon bringing a newborn home from the hospital, but that nobody ever seems to actually come home with.

Somehow she seemed to muddle through the *raising of the children* part, at least so far neither of them has become an axe murderer….and she did it without the instruction manual. Yes, one is into tattooing himself rather extensively, but so far, it’s been confined to one arm and part of a leg. She’s even recently asked him if his need to tattoo has anything to do with the fact that his parents were breaking up. She’s still concerned about scarring her children for life, even though they are pretty much adults now. As far as tattooing himself goes, it’s been something he’s talked about for years and she believes him when he assures her it has nothing to do with herself and his father.

She wonders how one *lives in the moment* when she can’t seem to concentrate on a moment long enough to do so? She thinks that maybe she has temporary Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD). Temporary since she has only been experiencing it since last summer. She’s hopeful that maybe someday it will cure itself, that since she didn’t always have ADD, one day it will be gone and she’ll be back to normal.

What is normal anyway? She’s forgotten what normal use to be and thinks that maybe she never really was *normal*. She thinks that *normal* probably changes given whatever situations life throws your way. Her situations have been pretty intense of late, at least to her. She could deal with not feeling normal if there weren’t drama of one kind or another involved. If she could learn to live in the moment, then maybe the drama would subside and she could just…. be.

How do you stop your mind from going a million miles per minute? Unless she can stop herself from constantly thinking, she will never recognize the moments she’s trying to live in. This is where a manual would come in handy. One could go to the Table of Contents, find the chapter on “Slowing Down Your Mind” and follow the directions. She’s a visual learner and likes to see things in writing; they make better sense to her that way. Having your mind going at top speed, always looking toward the future and the long term goals she has, as opposed to the short term goals, is exhausting and sometimes even makes her cry. The ability to live moment to moment and enjoy each and every one of them would be such a relief for her at this point.

Currently she’s reading “The Complete Idiots Guide to Zen Living”, hoping that it will assist her in recognizing *the moments* so that she can take the time to live them. Unfortunately she has still not gotten past Chapter 2 yet, but she’s working on it. Her concentration has not been the best lately, so getting through “Zen Living” has been a bit of a trial.

Her goal for today is to try and at least recognize some *moments* in her day and maybe even enjoy one or two of them. She is going to plan to enjoy posting this piece on line, at the very moment it appears. If she can anticipate the moments prior to them appearing, then maybe she’ll have a better chance of living in them. She wonders if this will qualify as *living in the moment*? Maybe not, but she might be a little closer. She’s still going to search for the manual though. It must be here somewhere…….