There is a classic saying from the meditation tradition of East Asia that is, “A painting of a rice cake will never actually nourish you”. One meaning of this is that thoughts, especially when imagining the past and future, cannot fulfill us the way the tangible immediate raw reality of the present moment can.
In that spirit, a friend recently asked me how to reconcile meditation practice with making plans. Say we are on the phone with someone, and they ask, “Can you meet up in two weeks at 2:30 pm?” If our attention is absorbed into the reality of the present moment and in letting go of the illusion of future and past, if we are seeing through our thoughts as if they were wispy steam, if we hear the person’s voice on the line as just sound rising and falling, if what we might otherwise interpret as a calendar we instead see as squiggles of color – it doesn’t seem likely that plans are going to be successfully made.
It seems to me that this question, though, is rooted in the common misconception about mindfulness meditation, which is that we have to stop thinking to do so. Instead, I think it helps to envision that the meditative awareness turns our thinking mind from something that unconsciously uses us into a tool that we make use of, and from a prison that we are locked in into a home that we can come and go from.
We can be conscious and aware that we are thinking about the future plans and create some spacious detail-rich noticing of our thoughts rising and falling, while also still inhabiting our conceptual mind enough to accomplish goals and successfully navigate the world.
Another tool that is helpful to stay grounded in and nourished by immediate presence when making plans is to feel the moment-by-moment tangible sensations of our body and/or breath as we do. When we’re on the phone with the person and they say, “Are you free in two weeks?”, as we answer we can also use our awareness to check in with, “Where in my body do I feel something right now?”, “Where in my body do I feel aliveness?”, and “Where in my body may I feel any tension?” This can also have us more in touch with our intuition and our inner truth.
Sayadaw U Pandita, a twentieth century Burmese teacher, apparently used to ask his students, “How many times did you breathe yesterday?”, and expect a real answer. I am not at that level of mindfulness, but I can remember times when I have had a job interview or first date, and kept awareness of my breathing as a practice that helped me stay grounded in a present-moment easeful simplicity even while I used my thinking mind and verbal abilities to discuss what I’ve done in the past, and worry about how this event could go in the future.
Another way that serious meditators plan for the future is to make a vow. These can sometimes be for grand spiritual ideals, but they are also often things like finishing a project, gossiping less, or not eating sugary foods. For example, just as Zen monks often get fully grounded in habits of ethical behavior before they “see through morality”, they also often commit to solid future behaviors before devoting themselves to paying attention only to the present.
These are a few of the strong tools on our side to help us to “Be Here Now” at times when we are called upon to contemplate “there and then”.