PRESENCE IN PRACTICE

​November 24th, 2025 

Today I tried to remain present. 

I tried to turn the toggle back whenever I noticed myself getting pulled back/forward - or even sideways for that matter. Sideways as in to something unsavory to give myself a rush. 

I thought about what it meant to stay in the present - and also how I'd practice it in real time. 

Instead of going back into my old self when something didn't work the way I wanted it to, I reminded myself that I am not that girl anymore, no matter how familiar the fear and pain started to feel - I simply was not that person anymore, and so by that token, it was like I never experienced those things first hand. 

In a very weird way, I hadn't. 

Similarly, I'm not yet all that I want to be, and until I am, there's no use in lulling myself into submission by way of fantasy. 

A very concrete example is with a man I've grown to know over the course of several weeks. I came to terms today with the fact that simply isn't any compatibility there. Despite some lukewarm attraction, and efforts, I suppose on both our ends. At my core, I don't feel kinship with this person. The kind of kinship I suppose my brain felt existed with [redacted] and yet that also fell through. 

This time it doesn't feel traumatic or painful to admit that in this instance - it simply feels like circumstance. Perhaps that's the internal scaffolding in action. Seeing this through a lens of circumstance and not necessarily a reason to toggle back in time to when I felt inadequate. 

On the sideways thing - I guess my emotional immaturity has been tugging at me all day. I'm back at odds with someone in proximity to me, and it felt like a little bit (a lot-a-bit) of a letdown. I interrogated myself and realized that I have been on my "best behavior" in hopes of keeping the peace, but again, I am realizing this person and I simply don't speak the same language. 

Of course it doesn't excuse this person's abhorrent behavior, no more than it does my own. I guess I am ready to charge it to the game and keep it moving. Something that keeps ringing true in my brain: it won't matter in six months. I'm choosing to beleieve on some level that this is divine guidance because truthfully I am lost. Once this course ends, I am simply lost as can be.

But feeling or being lost is a part of the journey sometimes, and right now, I trust myself enough to traverse it successfully. I guess I have no choice, because I am doing that right now. 

Another side of me wonders if my breakthrough is on the horizon, I feel like I've been put through a lot, but I'd be an ingrate if I didn't acknowledge the miracles put forth to get me here. 

Anyway, presence in practice - it's a lot less stimulating than I'd like it to be. Acknowledging that I don't have the data needed in real time to form a direction forward. That toggling backwards would just be a projection into the void of what once was (but is no longer). And leaping forward is like walking this trail I am on called life - I simply know what lies ahead, only what's now. 

I guess today was a good day, despite the challenges.

Thank you, God. 

- vetiveroil