Would you ponder so much about the meaning of life if you knew you’d be gone tomorrow? Time is directly proportional to thought, I believe. The more time we believe we have, the more energy we waste on thinking. If you knew you’d be gone tomorrow, all you’d want to do is live. But in the absence of such a pressing deadline, we keep postponing the living and we keep prioritising the mulling. It’s good to mull over things like birds and sunshine and the colour of your tea. But I’m not sure it’s such a good idea to mull over the lack of direction in your relationship or the uninspiring nature of your job. It may not be a good idea to spend precious minutes analysing the defects in your appearance and the faults in your peers. Perhaps philosophising is a purer form of thought. But it’s still not as good as running, singing or loving. It’ll never be as good as baking a cake or eating one. Sometimes when I’m working out, I’ll start to wonder what the point is if my body is going to be ashes one day anyway. Why should I invest so much time in sculpting and perfecting it? The answer is simple. Because in this moment, it feels good. It’s rewarding, exhilarating and it gives me purpose. Even if I were to be gone tomorrow, today would have all the meaning in the world. The future does not lend definition to your present moment. The present lends definition to the present moment.
