The power of now
In many professional circles, from sports to medicine, there is frequent talk of staying in the moment, being present, avoiding biases from the past and so on. But how to achieve that, especially on a consistent basis, is where things get seriously fuzzy. Often that part is not even mentioned per se, as if assuming that it will magically happen if we desire it. But we all know this is not really the case. How many times we can be fully in the present for an extended period of time, without our attention drifting to something else in the environment or to planning some future tasks ? Or to replaying some piece of the past in different scenarios ?
A famed psychologist, M. Csikszentmihalyi, coined the term “flow” - what we feel when we are “fully alive”, in harmony with the environment around us and voluntarily involved in whatever we are doing. He described it as a merger of action and awareness where self-consciousness dissolves in a complete identification with the task. Often the perception of time is also distorted with the subjective perception moving in opposite direction from the objective time on the clock. On the emotional side, the experience becomes its own reward, free from any worry about failure. And when does this state occur ? It is interesting to note that Csikszentmihalyi describes it as being most common with activities that are blending pleasure and action - the left and the right side in Sahaj terms: singing, dancing and sports.
At a closer look though, things are not that simple. Firstly, this state of flow is a “peak” experience, meaning it is a relatively rare occurence even when conditions are right. Secondly, the left-right blend - which by the way is what the ha-tha in hatha yoga means - has a couple of clearly different patterns : the right (action) may get dissolved in the emotion generated by singing and dancing; alternatively, the left (emotion) may get absorbed in the sheer intensity of the action and the complete attention it demands in activities that are inherently high stakes like professional sports, rock climbing, etc. This suggests that balance and sustainability are even more elusive than the flow experience which is itself rather uncommon.
For balance to occur the merger of left and right should happen in an ascending way, where both are dissolved in a higher state of consciousness rather than one side absorbing the other. For the process to be sustainable and reproducible with a degree of control, it should not depend on external factors briefly falling into a narrow Goldilocks zone but should be completely internalized. Luckily, this is very much how our subtle system works after Self Realization, when our Kundalini provides the unifying as well as the ascending force. She gives us the ability to dissolve together emotion and action into the state of mental silence, with its inbuilt background of peace and joy. And this is something we can reliably experience everyday and eventually develop into our default mode of existence.