---
title: "On living in the future and in the present"
author: "Stan Voo"
url: https://www.99rabbits.com/blog/on-living-in-the-future-and-in-the-present
published: 2011-12-29
summary: "When you live in the future, every problem is an infuriating delay. Live in the present, and the problems and routines turn out to be life itself."
---

# On living in the future and in the present

When you live in the future, any new problem that delays its arrival brings on a fit of irritation, or at least a bad case of nerves. You're angry that you can't move on because of the obstacle that has come up. In effect, you're wasting your energy: problems are an inevitable and important part of any path *(even a path with a lowercase p)*.

Besides accepting problems as an inevitable but surmountable given, you can also try **simply not living in the future**. Living in the present, it's easier to accept that these "problems" and "routines" are life itself.

Race through it with a stopwatch, "I'm not keeping up" and "so much still to do" running through your head, fast-forwarding it like a videotape, or slow down and actually live it?

Fast-forwarding life, trying to skip what you have now and go straight to dessert, invariably ends in "agonizing pain" over the time and the chances you missed.

Something like that.

Thanks for the inspiration to [Leo Babauta](http://zenhabits.net/) (for example, his book [*Focus: A Simplicity Manifesto in the Age of Distraction*](http://www.amazon.com/Focus-simplicity-manifesto-Age-Distraction/dp/1434103072/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8\&qid=1325194983\&sr=8-1)) and [Armen Petrosyan](https://www.facebook.com/ap428) (his blog is "[Zhit interesno!](http://petrosian.ru/)", "Living is interesting!").