How can we follow the Buddhas Sutra to "live in the present" when it doesn't exist?

[rockyysdt]

I was hoping for insight and/or assistance about living life in the present?

 

In the sutra “Knowing the Better Way to Live Alone,” the Buddha said clearly, “Don't get caught in the past, because the past is gone. Don't get upset about the future, because the future is not yet here. There is only one moment for you to be alive, and that is the present moment".

 

My problem is that it appears that the present moment doesn't exist.

 

If you draw a line and say:      To the left of the line lies the past.      To the right of the line is the future.          But where lies the present?

 

 

If you view the dividing line between the past and the future, from a microscopic point of view it appears as a having a very large thickness.

To a microscopic being it may appear 10 miles wide or greater.

How quickly can a microscopic being take to traverse this vast distance of this very thick line.

Which part of this very thick line represents the past and which part of it represents the future?

Which part of this can ever represent the present?

 

This line can be made thinner approaching infinity, but the being observing it might be much closer to infinity in size.

We have the same dilemma.

 

The only way I can see the line being thin enough is to make it narrower than infinitely thin.

By definition it would have to disappear.

 

If it disappears then this supports my initial dilemma that the present cannot exist, as there cannot be anything bordering the past from the future.

 

How can I practice being in the moment if it doesn't exist?

 

Even if you replace distance with time (space/time and the theory of relativity) the problem is worse.

 

You would need to stop time.

If you stop time then the future cannot occur.

[rockyysdt]

13 hours ago, rockyysdt said:

  But where lies the present?

 

The only way I can see the line being thin enough is to make it narrower than infinitely thin.

By definition it would have to disappear.

 

Even if you replace distance with time (space/time and the theory of relativity) the problem is worse.

 

A scientist, Donald Hoffman, can verify that the theory of relativity breaks down below "10 to the power of -33" seconds.

 

But even in this minuscule passage of time you'd have to be very quick to be in the moment.

[degrub]

I would suggest a different frame of reference than the physical. Imagine watching thoughts passing through your mind as you meditate. Watch them flow as you concentrate on your breath. As they go by, that is the present.

[Will B Good]

2 hours ago, rockyysdt said:

 

A scientist, Donald Hoffman, can verify that the theory of relativity breaks down below "10 to the power of -33" seconds.

 

But even in this minuscule passage of time you'd have to be very quick to be in the moment.

 

 

Time just got much shorter....

 

 

Planck time is the smallest meaningful unit of time in physics, representing the time it would take for light to travel one Planck length in a vacuum. It’s named after the physicist Max Planck, who developed the concept as part of a set of natural units in quantum mechanics.

Mathematically, Planck time ( t_P ) is defined as:

t_P = \sqrt{\frac{\hbar G}{c^5}}

where:

    •     \hbar  is the reduced Planck constant,
    •     G  is the gravitational constant, and
    •     c  is the speed of light in a vacuum.

The value of Planck time is approximately  5.39 \times 10^{-44}  seconds. 

[rockyysdt]

10 hours ago, Will B Good said:

 

 

Time just got much shorter....

The value of Planck time is approximately  5.39 \times 10^{-44}  seconds. 

My sources claim that space time no longer computes at time values smaller than 10^{-43}  seconds.

 

Time slower than 10^{-41}  seconds with a length smaller than 10^{-31} cms will result in a black hole.

 

But back to the OP issue, how does this affect being in the moment?

[rockyysdt]

10 hours ago, degrub said:

I would suggest a different frame of reference than the physical. Imagine watching thoughts passing through your mind as you meditate. Watch them flow as you concentrate on your breath. As they go by, that is the present.

Well put degrub, but by the time one sees and registers these thoughts you are viewing the past.

 

So it's back to square one.

[degrub]

True. Yet , there is something there at the edge of the “past”, yes ?
i would not expect the Buddha to have known quantum physics though. So how else might the saying have been intended ? 

Was it even recorded and translated properly ? Unknowable , i think.

[rockyysdt]

3 hours ago, degrub said:

True. Yet , there is something there at the edge of the “past”, yes ?
i would not expect the Buddha to have known quantum physics though. So how else might the saying have been intended ? 

Was it even recorded and translated properly ? Unknowable , i think.

If there is an edge, I think it would be at infinity.

 

As you can  never reach infinity in time nor space, you can never be in the moment.

[Brucenkhamen]

The present exists, but it is a relative concept, relative to past and future.

 

What I think you're musings are pointing to though is that "the present" is a relative concept that is dependent on how we experience it and how we measure it.  We experience our reality in a constant flow of moment to moment change and it is impossible to really say that this moment is in the past, that moment is in the present, and here comes the one in the future.

 

The teaching is not about metaphysics but about understanding the true nature of your experience.