Variety: Genesis 28v16

When Jacob awoke from his sleep, he thought, “Surely the LORD is in this place, and I was not aware of it.” (Genesis 28:16)

Every day I would sit at a particular set of five-way traffic lights at the end of my road. It always seemed like an interminably long red light, but one day, it seemed even longer than usual, and I clearly heard God saying to me, “Richard, are you really going to be any happier on the other side of the traffic light?”   

I had to wonder, “If you’re not happy on this side of the traffic lights, you’re not going to be happy on that side of the traffic lights. So why not just be happy now?” It’s that simple and that hard. It became a place for my little daily meditation. Every time I stopped at that red light, I thought, “Okay, here I get to practice it again. Everything is right here, right now.  If I can’t experience God and love and myself and everything that matters on this side of the traffic lights, I probably won’t experience it over there.” I hope you can find your own examples. 

That’s what we mean by the practice of the present moment. I cannot think of any spiritual practice which will transform our lives into love and into God more than simply trying to live in the naked now, in the sacrament of the present moment. There’s nothing to “figure out” about this practice, so don’t even try. Figuring it out isn’t really helpful.  When we are an alert presence, placing one foot in front of the other, there is no separation anymore between the secular and the sacred, between ourselves and God.   

Richard Rohr