The biggest challenge for me always was to get out of my head and be present. It sounds like a very obvious thing that anyone who’s not mental would be able to do. But if I struggle with it half the time, does that mean I am delusional? My own answer to that is yes. I fantasize and imagine and daydream a lot. As a kid that was considered a bad thing but I thought they were just assholes, making me feel bad about myself. And they were. But now I come to realize that if I want to have the life I want I need to face the life I have. To learn to be present is hard. First you need to ask yourself: Why do I live in my head so much? Is my fantasy better than real life? Then a more difficult question is: What is wrong with my life? That can take a while. To admit that something bothers you is hard. To admit that your life is a bunch of bullshit is hard. But that’s a very extremist way of thinking, and harsh, and untrue. Anyone’s life is multidimensional. When you get out of your head you stop focusing on the bad things. For me the first step was to recognize that each moment is spontaneous. Each moment can become whatever you make of it. There is no grand plan. You can turn the corner or go straight at any given moment. For example right now, you can make a cup of coffee, or go outside, or listen to music, or go for a jug, right? That freedom is always there, with few exceptions. To stop escaping is both simple and hard. The simple part of it is that you can snap out of it and just look around the room. The hard part of it is to stay there. What’s the trick? To find something that interests you. If you’re bored you’ll keep slipping out of it. To redirect life to make it interesting is the ultimate goal. To stop waiting for the perfect future. Because there is no future. As awful as it sounds, it’s not awful at all. Future is just a projection. There is no past either, because it’s only a memory. What we have is only NOW.

This feels like I rambled a lot, but I hope there is some sense in it.

Yours,

Natasha Pea