Cover image for Paccuppanna – The Present Moment

Paccuppanna – The Present Moment

Awareness has a mirror-like quality. We can tap into it right now, become aware of the mind and body as they are in this moment. Perhaps awareness is reflecting the feeling of sleepiness or of not knowing, the feeling of cold or heat, heaviness or lightness. Reflective consciousness can see things, even the things that are closest to us. It reflects feelings of aversion, anger, kindness, pleasant feelings, unpleasant feelings – all kinds of things. This quality of seeing, of knowing this reflective mind, is neutral. There is no sense of judging or criticising; awareness merely reflects the judging or the critical mind. That is what the Buddha is talking about when he says that the Dhamma is ‘apparent here and now’; not tomorrow or yesterday, but here and now in the present moment. And the Dhamma is timeless – it is not dependent on time.