Living in the present can be a big problem || Acharya Prashant (2022)

Questioner (Q): Most often we are asked to live in the present and be here and now and mindful. Can you talk to us about that?

Acharya Prashant (AP): The same thing, I mean, when we were talking about what to do with knowledge, I said it depends on the intention. It depends on the center that is going to now use knowledge. We are two, there are two centers, right? We are repeating that thing again and again.

So, you could choose to live in the present because it is more pleasurable to forget the consequences of your vile actions, right? If you think of most of the heinous crimes that are ever committed, the criminals were absolutely in the present, were they not? Were they thinking of the consequences? No.

I liked it, I did it. I felt like… there are well thought out, organized and planned crimes, right? But a majority of the crimes are kind of spontaneous. There is sudden inflammation and explosion. That fellow was surely in the present, was he not?

With no concern for anything in the past or in the future, anything beyond this place, this occasion, this event, nothing. I got angry, I shot him. So, this that we call as living in the moment can very well be utilized by the ego for its own nefarious ends.

Equally living in the present could mean selfless action, Niṣkāma Karm. I'm doing what is right and I do not bother about the results. Mostly what we do is from the wrong center. So, when it comes to living in the present, that too is mostly from the wrong center.