We as humans are now living among so many distractions, yet we find a way to think about the past and the future. It’s time to realize that every passing moment is a moment passed and etched in time that will never return. Hence, we need to savor every moment in our life. Hence, it’s important to embrace the now using the tools and techniques to live in the present moment shared in this article.

However, first, let’s understand mindfulness. Living in the present is the idea that you experience the current moment and the feelings, emotions, and all the other internal elements along with the reception of the external stimuli and processing it, this is called mindfulness. Mindfulness is a difficult state to carry out. However, in this article, we will provide you with tools and techniques to live in the present moment.

Mindfulness Meditation:

Meditation is an ancient practice to bring calm, peace, and an experience of serenity in the present moment and live within that moment. Meditation has been practiced over many years and now that we are surrounded by so many external stimuli, it’s time to capture smaller moments in time and encapsulate them.

Meditation allows to calm you down and helps in bringing in some peace and tranquility. As you sit down with minimal stimuli around you, you can focus on yourself and your breathing exercises. This ensures that your attention is solely focused on yourself. This is a practice that you should learn from a coach because depending on how your mind works you may need diverse types of meditative practices.

Gratitude Practices:

Gratitude is one of the most popular tools suggested by coaches. The popularity it has is because of how wonderfully amazing it is. It can be practiced via any means but the best way to go about it is to write a journal. What you need to do is, when you wake up in the morning look around you, see the comforts you have in life, and be grateful for them.

Once you’ve got your breakfast and coffee sit down for 10 minutes and write about what are you grateful for. It can be the coffee, the breakfast, the bed you have, to the living space you have. any and everything that you have is something to be grateful for. One of the most essential elements of this practice is being grateful for your health. This exercise reminds you of how blessed you are and how you shouldn’t take things for granted.

Body Scan Meditation:

Scanning the body meditation is one of the best practices. It instantly relaxes you and puts your mind at ease. Body Scan also makes use of energy work. You use your energy to scan various parts of your body and as you go through this process you become increasingly relaxed. Once you become relaxed you can feel different sensations in your body and feel every organ and body part playing its role in making your life easier.

This is also another exercise that requires to be performed with the help of a coach or meditation practitioner. Coaches can be an immense help in guiding you through this exercise since it requires mindfulness, patience, and relaxation.

Breath Control Techniques:

Breathing exercises are also a great tool and they really allow you to focus on your body and mind. It focuses all your consciousness on your breath, and you can then be completely calm. This happens because all your attention is directed towards your breathing exercise, hence you become less aware or conscious of what else is going around. Hence thoughts invade your mental space and you become one with your mind and body.

This is a cliched term becoming one with mind and body but in breath work it actually happens because you completely home in on your breathing and all your attention is either on counting down or counting up and then some coaches ask you to try to live the moment between the breaths. Hard to understand let us explain. When you breathe, what naturally happens if you take a breath in and you let that breath out, so what the coaches do sometimes in this case is to ask you to try to catch the moment in between those breathes where you’re breathing in transitioned into breathing out.

This is a powerful tool, and it certainly guides people to be more calm and more present in the moment and experience it.

Cognitive Restructuring:

Many psychiatrists and psychologists have been making use the cognitive restructuring techniques on their patients and they have been successful with the results. Most of us worry about the future and regret the past, that’s how it is for all human beings. We are hard-wired as human beings to attach emotions and feelings to memories. Cognitive behavior therapy with the help of a coach can help us detach those feelings and emotions from that memory.

The idea is to rewire your brain towards a positive mindset. The thought process is that instead of getting negative emotions and feelings from those memories, positive and motivational thought patterns are attached to those memories. Hence whenever they resurface you can detach from them and manage your activities better.

Mindful Eating:

Mindful eating is the most simplistic and least practiced meditation activity. Despite the ease of doing this activity, not many people practice it. The simple task of eating that we perform multiple times a day can bring a lot of mindfulness if practiced. We are living in a fast-paced world, and for this activity, we must slow down and remove the distractions. Such as turning off the TV, mobile, and other things that may take our attention away from the food.

The activity is simply to savor the food you are eating. Find a good spot and experience each bite, the texture of the food, the taste, and how it makes you feel when you eat and swallow it. This will also build a positive and healthy relationship with food and your desire to learn more about what you eat and how it affects your body.

Time Blocking and Prioritization:

Managing time is one of the things that we as humans are constantly trying to perform. Time management is an arduous task however with the help of a good coach you may be able to time block and prioritize tasks better.

Time blocking is also a mindful activity because it focuses us to home in on one task at hand at one time and our attention is completely devoted to that one singular task. Hence time blocking is important, so speak to your coach and talk about how you have difficulty time blocking and prioritizing individual tasks. This helps you to be present in the moment, perform one task at a time and put conscious effort into that task.

Nature Connection:

Nature is the best healer for the soul. We do not get the opportunity to go outside and experience nature the way our ancestors used to. However, incorporating a walk or a jog in your day will help a lot as well. Coaches suggest disconnecting from devices and immersing themselves in the experience of being outdoors.

Leave your devices behind and take a walk, jog, or go for a run, all of these will refresh your mind and bring you a lot of tranquility. Feel the sunlight on your face, the warmth, the soil underneath your feet, the grass with your hands, leaves, and all that. Sit on the ground to let the healing nature of Mother Nature heal you.

Mindful Reflection:

Reflection helps in understanding yourself better in many ways. There are two ways you can do that; the first one is to self-reflect and the second is to speak to a trusted person. Someone who upholds the same values as you. Trusted friends and family members can help you gain back confidence and live a peaceful and successful life.

For self-reflection, the best way to understand yourself is to write a journal. Journaling helps you to self-reflect not only yearly, monthly weekly, in fact daily. This helps you understand how you reacted to certain situations and how you could have acted better. All these things help in understanding yourself better and improving yourself every single day.

Living in the present moment

Living in the moment is hard these days, we cannot adjust this much. Yes, it’s hard but is it hard enough that we cannot enjoy smaller little joys? We should at least be able to put our devices down for a couple of minutes and ensure that we take in the more meaningful moments in life. Being present in the moment and living every moment is important because those moments don’t last very long. Remember this thing forever that once a moment has passed it is gone forever, your child’s first step, the first day of school, etc., many such things happen once in life. And yes, you can capture them on your phone but don’t forget to live that day and experience the emotions with your family and within.

References:

https://www.calm.com/blog/how-to-be-more-present

https://positivepsychology.com/present-moment/

https://www.verywellmind.com/how-do-you-live-in-the-present-5204439

https://psychcentral.com/blog/what-it-really-means-to-be-in-the-present-moment

https://www.betterup.com/blog/how-to-be-present

https://www.becomingminimalist.com/10-tips-to-start-living-in-the-present/