On September 21, 2024, I listened to an interview with Peter Kreeft about the paradoxes of human life. For example, we are told regularly to live in the moment. Let's unpack this. The present moment is fleeting and elusive. Augustine said in The Confessions that as soon as I try to identify the present, it is already gone. It's like "a knife edge without thickness" that merely connects past and future. For example, when I sing a psalm, I have expectation about what I am about to sing and then memory of what I have sung, but the singing of it flies by so quickly. Augustine gives three aspects of the present: 1. The present of past things (memory) 2. The present of present things (attention/direct perception) 3. The present of future things (expectation) And yet, Augustine shows that the present moment is all we have available to us. We must live here and now, for the past is gone and the future is not yet. So what do we do? Let me propose our four options: ## 1) We can live *for* but not *in* the present moment. Most people exist here and they remain in perpetual discontent. The ache for experience but then, if by some means, they attain that for which they ache, the do not know how to enjoy it because they've trained their conscious awareness always to be expecting, yet never attending. As a result, these people move from vacation to delicacies, from sexual partner to business partner, longing for fulfillment but never attaining it. They are locked into a perpetual state of discontentment unless they break free to live in, but not for, the present moment. Or some unhappy souls will devolve into the nihilism of living neither for nor in the present moment. ## 2) We can live *in* and *for* the present moment. To live in and for the present moment is to be ruled by instinct. Animals are mostly oriented to life in this way. It is true, they are likely not beset with the burdens of the past, nor dread the anticipation of the future. But they are surely limited for having less understanding than humans. 1 Corinthians 15:32 - "If the dead are not raised, “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.” ## We can live *neither in* *nor for* the present moment. People in this category may have tried to live in and for the present moment but found it wanting. As a result, they have given up hope for anything meaningful or satisfying under the sun. This can devolve into nihilism. They cannot bear to experience the distress of the present moment without numbing themselves. ## Live *in* the present moment, but *not for* the present moment. We went to live in the present moment because, as Augustine taught, it is all we have to live in. We cannot live in the past or the future. Then and there is not accessible to us. But here and now is. Therefore, we must live in the present moment. But we must not live for the present moment, but instead for the future. [[Bema - Judgment Seat]] | | In | Not In | | ------- | ------------------- | ------------ | | For | Instinct/Epicureans | Dissatisfied | | Not For | Enlightened | Nihilists | *** [[Proverbs for My Children]] [[Augustine on Time]]