“Real generosity towards the future lies in giving all to the present.”
Albert Camus
On the 12th of February, I touched on how, amid change, things tend to stay the same. Today I want us to meditate on the future, on that period of time which is a reflection of our past and which also tend to repeat the past. The question is, how do you perceive the future? How do you treat that old deceiver whose cheating game never grows stale? More so, what can we truly know of the future except that the future is whatever you try to make of it?
We tend to view the future as that period of time in which everything will be better. According to Ambrose Bierce, the future is a time in which our affairs will prosper, our friends will be true and our happiness will be assured. Is this not a bit naïve? Some may think so, but I don’t. We have to have something to aim for, but, you know as well as I do, that things don’t always come out the way we intend. The future is seen as the torch of the past and the guiding star of the present, unfortunately, as the well-known French philosopher and mystic, Simone Weil said, the future is made of the same stuff as the present.
In an address to the nation, President Lyndon Johnson once said that yesterday is not ours to recover, but tomorrow is ours to win or to lose. We ought therefore to review the past, not in order to return to it, but that we may find in the past the direction it points us with regard to the future. Another aspect to point out is NOT to forget to live in the NOW. People have the tendency to focus so much on the future and the past, that they forget to embrace the here and the now. There is an enlightening piece written about The Power Of Living In The Now. The following is said, and I think that this is worth thinking about – after all, this blog is about thinking and rethinking:
The past does not exist; it's over with and should be nothing but a fading memory. The future does not exist; it simply hasn't happened yet. Both the past and the future are only a part of your thoughts and memories; they only exist in your mind and not in reality. The only thing that really exists right now is the very present moment that you live in and from this present moment you can draw tremendous power; the kind of power that can change your life and allow you to achieve your goals.
I think that Camus was quite right to say that our generosity to the future (and all that we want to achieve and dream for), lies in giving everything to the NOW – the present. Open it, it is a present after all!
A final thought – Think about this today:
What is the future but unknown territory,
a time and place which we cannot yet see.
Continuously we attempt to predict tomorrow
just to be disappointed and filled with sorrow.
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