Being Present Works. It does. Works as a Noun and Works as a Verb. Being consciously present satisfies your inmost desire and allows you to express your happiest, most enlightened self. Still, there is a sense that you are “working at it” and there are many practices and approaches that can be used, depending on temperament and situation.
Excerpt from Traning the Mind by Chogyam Trungpa:
The practice of Tonglen is quite straightforward. It is an actual meditation practice in which you give away your happiness, your pleasure, anything that feels good. All of that goes out with the out breath. As you breathe in, you breathe in any resentments and problems, anything that feels bad. The whole point is to remove territoriality altogether. The practice of Tonglen is very simple. We simply breathe out any old good and breathe in any old bad. At first we may seem to be relating primarily to our ideas of good and bad. But as we go on, it becomes more real. Sometimes we feel terrible that we are breathing in poison which might kill us and then breathing out whatever little goodness we have. It seems to be completely impractical, but once we begin to break through realize that we have even more goodness and we also have more things to breathe in. So the whole process becomes somewhat balanced. The more negativity we taken with a sense of openness and compassion, the more goodness there is to breathe out on the other side. Tonglen should not be used as any kind of antidote. You do not do it and then wait for the effect. You just do it and drop it. It doesn’t matter whether it works or not, if it works you breathe that out, if it does not work you breathe that in. You do not possess anything. That is the point.
There is a sense in which any of the techniques and ideas described in this blog all lead to one place: Finding your will. Finding the willingness, the strength, the focus to be present in all moments. This is built over time by being present in as many moments as possible. Vitality and well being are enormously helpful toward this end.
The whole process is very simple, actually. Unfortunately, explaining the simplicity takes a lot of vocabulary, a lot of grammar. However it is a very simple matter. And that matter concerns you and your world. Nothing else. It does not particularly concern enlightenment, and it does not particularly concern metaphysical comprehension. In fact, this simple matter does not particularly concern the next minute or the minute before this one. It only concerns the very small area where we are now.