5 Smart Ways to Hang Out More in the “Now”

Imagine there's no time.

Source: Photo by Susan K. Perry

I’m not a philosopher. I do, however, enjoy having my mind bent briefly into pretzel shapes by reading books by scientists and philosophers who have a knack for writing for broad audiences. I recently dove into such a book, In Search of Now: The Science of the Present Moment. In it, award-winning science author Jo Marchant makes a good case for the likelihood that, in real physical reality, there is no such thing as “now.”

In my own research in creativity, I’ve made a case for the merits of learning to expand your time spent in a flow state. That’s when you’re deeply engaged in some challenging activity, so single-mindedly focused, in fact, that time seems to stop. Which tends to feel mighty pleasant. Could spending more of our time in flow, then, be a kind of perpetual—while flow lasts—state of “now”?

Consider these ideas that were inspired by my reading of In Search of Now:

1. Learn something new and get good at it. Depending on your personality and time constraints, this may mean first dabbling at a variety of new pursuits, and then, ideally, you’ll choose one and delve deeply into it so that you become very good at it. That's when you no longer have to “think” but allow the thing itself to carry you along. Compare how it feels when you’re writing a first draft and letting the ideas come almost unbidden, to how it feels when you put on your editor’s cap and think hard to come up with the very best way to phrase a thought.
2. Rearrange your schedule so that you have enough time to stop time. That means, for many of us, that if you avoid flow activities due to too much constraint on the time you have for such intensive sessions, decide what you can give up (animal videos or doom-scrolling, anyone?). Allow yourself the potentially lasting satisfaction of working toward an actual goal.
3. Don't assume that your perception of time is the only or accurate one. Our brains construct a version of when “now” is, of when exactly the present moment exists. Each of our “right now” moments contains memories of past moments that relate to this one. And such a moment is gone too fast for anything to really happen in it, not to mention that our human brains have been shown by scientists to be very slow at putting together the signals of our senses. Your perceived “now” is already in the recent past.
4. Remind yourself that what matters most about the “be here now” concept is to give up thoughts of approval by others. Settle into the task you’ve chosen and let the future wait its turn. In a way, you’re stretching out your experience of “now,” which is really the only place anything real can happen.
5. Be aware in your relationships that others may think differently from you about time. I think of my late husband, who had no problem entering a flow state daily to write poetry, who believed in and trusted the present far more than any future time. Whereas from an early age, I tended to look ahead, always thinking and planning and barely able to recognize, even as a child, that now is where we live. We probably would have had fewer arguments if we had understood on a gut level that such varied ways of understanding “now” are equally valid. Actually, it's possible that such perceptions are somewhat delusional anyway, per current science.

If you’re uncertain what the fuss is about the whole “now” idea, read a book or two to get a better handle on it. I stuck little notes in Marchant’s book, especially in the first half. The philosophy and psychology of the present moment fascinate me, while the latter part of the book focuses more on that whole “quantum physics” weirdness that my mind balks at comprehending.