When is Now

"Wherever you are, be there totally. If you find your here and now intolerable and it makes you unhappy, you have three options: remove yourself from the situation, change it, or accept it totally" -Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now

I’ll wait until…

Next week, I’ll…

Everything will fall into place when….

I’ll do that when….

I’m finding myself procrastinating.

At work, at home, in training, with fundraising, amid the little annoyances and the big dreams alike, I’ve been putting things off, endlessly re-reading the to-do list, mentally re-configuring training schedules – and somehow thinking that IT will be somehow better or easier or make more sense (and that I will somehow be better, faster, smarter, more worthy?) when…..

Then on Friday morning, during our long run, my Sage Endurance teammate Claire reminded me that ‘when’ is always NOW.

Now is always the moment in which we are creating the life we’re leading and now is always the moment in which we have the opportunity to create the life we want to lead. It’s always now. Basic and profound.

As our coach reminded us of in her recent blog post, even when we know this truth, it’s so easy to forget it as we putter away minutes, mark the 9 to 5 cycle, and watch weeks click off the calendar never to be recaptured.

Mix this procrastination with a hint of questioned confidence and it becomes a self-feeding cycle. For me it's been:

In the office: I won’t raise that idea because I don’t yet have it all figured out. But somehow there’s always more to figure out.

Thinking of racing/ life/ professional goals: I can’t do that job, distance, speed, title yet because I might not do as well as I want to. But, somehow, I always want to do better.

Really pushing personal limits in training: I’ll wait until next week when I’ll have more sleep, time, mental preparation to really go for it. But, somehow there’s always more I need to do.

For some of the single moms living at Genesis Home, I bet it's similar: I’ll look for that job, complete that school application, deal with my emotional issues later, when I’m really, REALLY ready. But, somehow I could always be more ready.

Well, not this week.

For me, for this week, my answer to question of when is going to be NOW.

In my training, in my work, in my life. It's now. Everyday that I get up and do the work and live each moment of the life I want, it becomes more true.