How Much Of Life Are You Actually Living?
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Consider a metaphor.
Transfer your weight onto one foot while leaning forward, in order that your center of gravity is temporarily over-extended, while simultaneously putting your free foot out to 'catch' yourself from falling. Now rinse and repeat. Thus: walking.
If you want to walk faster, lean further forward. It's like watching a Segway, but with articulation.
All willful locomotion -- whether bipedal or otherwise -- depends on initiating a controlled disequilibrium which ultimately results in a prefered new equlibrium.
So it is with looking forward to things in life. Planning for the future. Saving for a rainy day. Working hard today for a better tomorrow.
The ability to conceptualize the _consequences_ of a temporarily destabilizing disequilibrium is what makes man master of the world.
So 'living in the future', far from being a modern malaise, is precisely what enables progress, advancement and civilisation. That doesn't mean that the disequilibrium is always comfortable while it's happening. Indeed, our atavistic selves usually counsel rest in the absence of an urgent limbic call to action -- when we're not starving or physically threatened, say.
But meanwhile, the higher brain recognises that the competion for scarce resources in a hostile world is relentless. And that means running to keep up -- however uncomfortable that might sometimes feel.
Indeed, deferred gratification (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deferred_gratification) is analysed as an indicator for intelligence and emotional maturity.
And as for the dishes, whatever he may claim, Thich Nhat Hanh's superordinate goal when he washes the dishes is to have clean dishes. If he can enter a state of flow (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology)) while doing so -- whether because he has phenomenal mental self-control, or an unusually quiet life -- then so be it. But most people can't, and would find their "cognitive surplus" (the brain parts left unused while dishes are being done) better invested in preparatory mental activity, or contructively anticipating the future.
And if he got the dishes done quickly rather than dawdling and daydreaming, he'd be back at the table to enjoy more time with his dinner guests, in whose gratitude he will find favour, and through whose company he will obtain the familiar state of flow which most humans achieve through routine social interaction.
Home life is measured in weeks and months, and when you ask somebody what's new, they'll say "not much" and maybe tell you what they did last weekend. Or the weekend before that.
Road life is measured in hours. I'll find myself telling somebody a story of this amazing thing that happened earlier on my trip, possibly in another country, and suddenly realize that it was only 3 days ago. A month of travelling compresses so much life into such a short span that it's really strange checking in with friends back in the world that can account for that same month with a single sentence.
There are times when life in the 'states can approximate that (the first weeks of a new startup for instance), but it's so easy to drop back into steady state where life is measured in calendar time.
Unfortunately we're somewhat trapped in by the slave driver that is money, when you eventually return from travels to settle down, you need to adhere to normal society.
Hopefully the startup will fix that, otherwise I'll just have to do it on the cheap and worry about money later ;)
Ramen Profitable == Beach Profitable
If your service can bring in $500/month, you can pretty much coast indefinitely in a place like Thailand, assuming you completely shut down your life back home. $1000 profit/month will get you to the point where you can travel from place to place. Double that again and you'll actually build your savings while dirtbagging around the world.
My ultimate goal would be to buy a cheapish yacht (they're cheaper than most people think) and sail around the world, like this guy: www.bigoceans.com - once you've got the yacht its not that expensive, I think that would be the ultimate freedom for me, and you can visit places that the average tourist can't get to!
Saying that, any kind of travel is good. I see you live by your word!
When you "hope for a better reality" you suggest that reality is something that happens to you, which in Zen terms (of which this article mostly is) isn't the case. It's more like something you "happen" to yourself. Since you are it.
That being said, if it is your desire to play the game (as it is mine at present), then yes, looking forward and planning for the future are important. Experience points must be gained to get to the next level; missions must be completed ;)
Kind of like children. They are our future but they exist now, in the present moment.
One can imagine an abstract model of a concrete physical object (e.g. a lever; a geometry; a count of objects) and then ignore the concrete reality, and become so fully immersed in the abstraction that one loses track of time. I suggest that this is a form of mindfulness. Thinking about an abstraction is not necessarily mindful: it can be done in a non-mindful way by being constantly distracted by other concrete objects or other abstract models. Mindfulness is flow.
The "future" is a abstract model, and so the above also applies to it.
For human beings, these imagined interior worlds - be they abstractions of objects or of the future - as just as much a reality as the physical world. I suggest that we naturally and instinctively apprehend them in the same way, and both can be done in mindfulness - or not.
To concentrate on an abstract object is basically the opposite of mindfulness, as you're ignoring your current experience.
However, I'm just restating my comment. I'm happy to agree to disagree with you. :-)
Not all activities are of equal value, and it's natural to want to maximize the high payoffs (time with family, solving good problems, sex, etc) and minimize the low (dishes).
edit: deleted example paragraph
But, really, if by 'doing the dishes to do the dishes', doing the dishes takes me twice as long, I don't want to do it that way. I'd much prefer to rush through it in half the time, to spend the other part of the time 'really living,' doing something I truly do enjoy or want to do.
The article seemed to be pointing out that it's up to you whether you decide to make doing the dishes an enjoyable activity or a chore. The point rottencupcakes seems to be making is that this might be true, but if doing the dishes in an enjoyable way makes them take longer, then he'd rather just not bother and get them done faster while not enjoying it.
This makes some sense to me. Sure, I could find a way to make every activity pleasant - there's always some way in which you can find satisfaction in any task, no matter how menial. And yet I still prefer to spend time figuring out how to just avoid or minimize those activities when I can.
I like this passage from Iain M. Banks, which sums up my feelings well:
He walked for days, stopping at bars and restaurants whenever he felt thirsty, hungry or tired; mostly they were automatic and he was served by little floating trays, though a few were staffed by real people. They seemed less like servants and more like customers who'd taken a notion to help out for a while.
'Of course I don't have to do this,' one middle-aged man said, carefully cleaning the table with a damp cloth. He put the cloth in a little pouch, sat down beside him. 'But look; this table's clean.'
He agreed that the table was clean.
'Usually,' the man said. 'I work on alien - no offence - alien religions; Directional Emphasis In Religious Observance; that's my speciality... like when temples or graves or prayers always have to face in a certain direction; that sort of thing? Well, I catalogue, evaluate, compare; I come up with theories and argue with colleagues, here and elsewhere. But... the job's never finished; always new examples, and even the old ones get re-evaluated, and new people come along with new ideas about what you thought was settled... but,' he slapped the table, 'when you clean a table you clean a table. You feel you've done something. It's an achievement.'
'But in the end, it's still just cleaning a table.'
'And therefore does not really signify on the cosmic scale of events?' the man suggested.
He smiled in response to the man's grin, 'Well, yes.'
'But then, what does signify? My other work? Is that really important, either? I could try composing wonderful musical works, or day-long entertainment epics, but what would that do? Give people pleasure? My wiping this table gives me pleasure. And people come to a clean table, which gives them pleasure. And anyway,' the man laughed, 'people die; stars die; universes die. What is any achievement, however great it was, once time itself is dead? Of course, if all I did was wipe tables, then of course it would seem a mean and despicable waste of my huge intellectual potential. But because I choose to do it, it gives me pleasure. And,' the man said with a smile, 'it's a good way of meeting people. So; where are you from, anyway?'
It won't _seem_ to take longer either, though this is a more subtle point. When you wash dishes wanting to just get it over with and move on to the next thing you'll be aware of the time almost constantly. Every extra cup you missed the first time is an annoyance. If you pay attention on the other hand you're most likely to achieve "flow" - which is incredibly easy to achieve with such menial activities btw. So not only you'll wash the dishes in most likely the least time possible, you won't even be aware of that time passing.
Stop thinking about whether the dishes are clean enough or not, you can see that. Stop thinking about whether it's fun or what you could you would rather be doing, which is only going to distract you from what you're tying to do now. Washing the dishes requires paying attention but not much in the way of cogitation. Instead of splitting yourself in two, just give the mental chatter a rest and look at what you are doing.
They're already doing precisely what they want at the exact interval they choose! Zen isn't teaching anything better than what we have; it isn't an improvement. Technically speaking, Zen isn't teaching anything, period. But that's the point.
Articles like these are good indicators that a person is starting to "get" Zen, a little bit. And that's great. Good luck Glen, and congratulations on choosing to live more in the moment. And congratulations in advance for whatever reality you choose to create next :)
Haven't read it or anything like it yet. Nevertheless, the idea that one might be caught up in planning and looking forward and forgetting the joy of the moment about that doesn't sound too far fetched to me...
What helps are repeating rituals. Like brushing teeth right before going to bed. Therefore one is able to switch different tasks more easily and separated.