I can’t really do anything other than be here — now

This pandemic has at least temporarily ripped apart any illusions of permanence.

But I find myself already trying to identify and claim the quasi-permanence of the next ‘new normal.’

Normal is that which is usual, typical, or expected. It’s what I long for. It’s what I can count on. It’s what we can collectively count on. Or used to. The absence of normal life as we knew it is one of the most terrifying aspects of this era of COVID19.

I’m being gently forced to confront what Buddhist doctrine has long asserted: All of existence, without exception, is transient and inconstant.  Anicca, in Buddhism, is the word for “impermanence.” Like many other words in the Buddhist vocabulary, it’s constructed as a negative. The prefix “a” reverses the word’s meaning. What is negated is the term “nicca,” which means permanent or unchanging.

As much as I may scramble to find a new normal, this moment refuses to bend to my desire for certainty. I am – and you are, we all are whether we like it or not – in an in-between place, caught between at least two worlds, the one we knew and the one that may come someday, whatever it may look like.

In this liminal moment, I face an important choice:

Do I put my life on hold, longing for the good old days, and reading every news brief for signs that the world is opening up, returning back to its old normal state?

The old normal may not have seemed perfect, but my memory of it feels safe. Comforting. Hopeful.

Or do I stay fully present in this time and place where I am betwixt and between, having left my accustomed way of living, but not yet entered a new, unknown, one?
Instead of looking back, wishing for the old normal, or forward trying to predict a new normal, accepting each moment as a changing ‘now normal?’

This is a scary place. I would have to let go of control (as though I ever had any to begin with!). But the very scariness and vulnerability of this liminal space might allow room for something entirely new to happen in my life.

“You can call it the ‘new normal,'” said Juliette Kayyem, a CNN national security analyst and former assistant secretary in the Department of Homeland Security. “I call it the ‘now normal’ because I think every day is going to be different.”

What might be the benefits of taking each moment as an ever-changing ‘now-normal?’

I can’t change what I don’t like about the past, and I can’t get back the parts I do like. So, worrying about the bad stuff or clinging to memories of the good in our uncertain world will do nothing but cause unnecessary anxiety.

This moment, right now, is the only time I have. I am here. I am now. And I love my life.

Great teachers like Eckard Tolle have long exhorted us to live in the ‘now.’ The ability to be in the present moment is a major component of mental wellness, said the American psychologist Abraham Maslow.

But in a world that feels normal, it has sometimes been very hard for me to do so. Finally, the universe is making it easier for me. It has made it abundantly clear – so clear that it’s impossible for me to ignore – that the ‘now normal’ is all I’ve got. And when I stop to recognize that we’re all equal in having only this moment, right now, I find I can be much more compassionate toward others.

What a gift the universe is giving me in this moment!