Gregg Krech (the author of “The Art of Taking Action”) joins Zachary to talk about being fully present, Japanese philosophy (and how we can learn a lot from tea ceremonies), overcoming your emotions, the myth of multitasking, momentum & consistency.
Links
- Morita Therapy
- Morita Therapy and the True Nature of Anxiety-Based Disorders by Shomo Morita
- Chasing Daylight by Eugene O’Kelly
- 30,000 Days: A Journal for Purposeful Living
- The Art of Taking Action: Getting Started and Finishing the Unfinished Course
- Japanese Tea Ceremony
- Eat That Frog by Brian Tracy
- Solar Flaring
- ToDo Institute
- The Art of Taking Action
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Awesome point Martin. Likely the reason we talk about the need to be aware of the present moment is because the amount of information, options, situations, aggravations and so on people deal with every day tend to give people very little time in the present moment. You and I (and likely most people who listen to the show) are very future oriented and it’s important to be reminded that the present moment is all there really is.
Derek Sivers recently posted a talk on “the meaning of life in 20 minutes.” Time was the first suggestion for the meaning of life and he argued that being mostly future focused is ideal. Check it out. I think you’ll like it: https://sivers.org/ml
This was, as usual, a really good and interesting episode! Thanks for continuing to make these available!
One thing that I thought about however, which is a thought that always comes up for me whenever the topic of ‘being present’ is debated, is why it’s a good thing to be present in the first place. This seems to be something that’s often accepted as a an axiom, but is it?
I don’t see the act of not being present as a bad thing. Sure, if you’re doing something super fun and you only can think about all the chores you’re supposed to do when you’re getting home, then you definitely have a problem that you need to work on. However, being able to travel to another time and place (or just having abstract discussions with yourself) in your head while doing something boring or uninteresting, I do consider like a gift rather than like a burden than needs to be fought against.
Further, the best meals for me is when I do something interesting while eating, for example watch or read something thought provoking. For me, *just* eating is a huge waste of time that I don’t care for particularly much. However, eating while doing something interesting makes both activities that much more enjoyable. (I’m not talking about a just bearable state here; I genuinely enjoy it very much when I’m *not* present.)
Same thing with for example going for a bike ride or jogging, which I do quite frequently. In and of itself, I find it quite boring and uninteresting. But if I listen to a podcast (such as for example yours) at the same time, the activity becomes highly enjoyable (even spiritual at times), and I can go on for hours.
For me, it’s a bit strange to hear people proclaim that I’m really not enjoying these activities at all, and that I need to learn to be more present (which is the message you’re kind of sending out when you’re not questioning your own axiom). Maybe we have totally different psychologies, where you seem to perceive things as eating, taking walks in the forrest, being with children, et cetera, as genuinely enjoyable experiences in and of themselves (and therefore worth diving in to deeper), while I just find them uninteresting and basically huge time-wasters in and of themselves.