Recently, I came to the realization that I was a bonafide time traveller and spent most of my time in the future. Rarely did I live in the present.

I was worrying about  the next day or the day after or even the following week.  Sometimes it was just a barrage of small things that caught me. I would worry about what to wear when I was going to church in a couple of days or to an event in a few weeks.

I spent most of my day in another dimension of time — the future.

Travelling to the future and then back to the present, over and over again, sent my thoughts spinning out of control.  I was always anticipating the worst.  My “fight or flight” response was  triggering all the time.

Worry was creating fear. Fear propelled me into the future.

Time travel was ruining my life.

Jesus warned us about living in another time dimension.

“Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.  Each day has enough trouble of its own. – Matthew 6:34 (NIV)

The Lord wanted us to stop worrying about what lay ahead. We are to simply put it out of our mind. We are told to take no thought about tomorrow.

I desperately needed to stay in the present and quit living in the future.  There was no doubt that a pattern of worry was deeply embedded in my brain.

It was an unhealthy lifestyle. Because of worry, I was easily distracted and unable to keep my focus for any length of time. I was forgetting where I put things.  This combined with poor eating habits and sleepless nights resulted in constant fatigue.

Engaging in the present became my mission.  Consciously pulling my thoughts out of the future and bringing them back to the present was exhausting and more of a workout than I could have imagined.

I had developed a habit of worry and it was hard to break.

I disciplined myself to pay attention to detail in whatever I was doing. This helped keep me grounded. I started to spend more time in the present and less in the future.  My eating and sleeping habits improved.

Living in the moment is the gift that keeps on giving back to me. Remembering where I placed my keys (most of the time),  eating healthier and sleeping better brings clarity and restores my peace of mind.

My feet are firmly planted on today’s ground.

I am choosing to leave time travel behind.