without comparison

Can we live each moment

Without comparison?

This is a huge challenge for us humans. Our minds love to compare. In every moment the mind is analysing, comparing with the past, looking for similarities, trying to find a way of classifying the present moment, labelling it, pigeon-holing it. And then, having found some similarity, the mind can respond from what it knows, from that huge store of experience, knowledge. And if it is a situation that it has come across many times, then the mind responds from habit. No analysis is needed. We merely press the repeat button. It's like modern electronic music, generated mechanically, repeating as many times as we want, without any variation, without any creativity. And this is how we live our lives much of the time, and the basis of it is that comparison going on in the mind, comparing this moment with past experiences.

So the challenge, our challenge, is to live each moment without that comparison, to meet each moment anew, as if we are a newborn baby, with innocent eyes, exploring, inquisitive, curious about what is in front of us, wanting to touch it, to taste it, to feel its flavour. And when we live this way, when we meet a moment with this emptiness of knowledge, without any comparison, when we live a moment thus, we feel ,it we are really alive in that moment, and the moment itself is a moment of eternity.

This is the way to really be, to be in the world, to be alive, to live. When we are merely responding from habit, from the known, from those comparisons, we are not really alive – we are existing merely as a dull echo. So whilst it demands a tremendous presence, awareness, sharpness on our part, it is worth us living this way, meeting each moment without comparison, seeing it for the unique moment that it is. This way we will truly appreciate our life. We will be living it.