I need my employee ID in order to get into my office (scan card). I never forget it. Yes, I keep it in my car, and so it’s where I need it. But what I mean is, I never get up to the door of the building and realize I don’t have it. Very occasionally (like today), I’ll get out of the car without the badge, take one or two steps, and immediately go back for it.
How is it that I don’t forget? It’s that I’m thinking ahead.
We talk about being in the moment, about “be here now,” about Zen consciousness, and yet, when I am getting out of my car, I am visualizing my next steps. I am visualizing entering the building, and I am visualizing needing the badge. If I was living in the “now,” it would be possible to notice my lack of badge only when I was at the “now” of the badge reader (and then I’d have to go back downstairs). But I never have to go back.
It’s nice, you know, because going back would be a pain in the ass. But it’s sad, in a way, to realize how far I am from being in the moment even in my most ordinary moments.
