Photo by Shantanu Kulkarni

Often times we hear that all we have is now. The past is in the past, the future is not yet here. And yet, trauma or not, it is hard to be in the now. Understandably so, because there are so many things vying for our time and attention. 

Also, if we are attached to an outcome or consumed by fear, we are looking for certainty, so being “in the now”, especially nowadays, can be very unsettling because we are not getting what we are looking for. 

In reality though, the only thing that is certain is the present moment. We don’t know what the future brings and we can’t connect the dots in the future; we can only do that by looking back. 

The story below is from Ram Dass. It is one of my favorite stories because it shows how the context can change and provide meaning when you look back, so all we can do is be present with what is. That’s where the certainty lies. 

It’s the same with trauma and chronic illness. We might feel like we can’t control some of the circumstances we find ourselves in. What we can control though is how we respond to the situation: by knowing that we can handle it in the “now” and not letting the moment or the situation take our power away. 

Sometimes “handling it” means we need to move, or step away from a conversation or the news. Or we ask for support. Whatever it is, we are the ones making the decision about the next step, as opposed to the situation dictating it. 

“There is a story of a farmer who had a horse that ran away.
His neighbor came by and said, “Oh, that’s terrible.”
The farmer said, “You never know.”

The next day the horse came back, and it was leading two other wild horses. The neighbor said, “That’s wonderful.”
And the farmer said, “You never know.”

Later, his son was training one of the wild horses, and while riding the wild horse, he fell off and broke his leg. The neighbor came by and said, “That’s terrible.”
The farmer said, “You never know.”

The Cossack army came through recruiting everybody, taking away all the able young men. They didn’t take the farmer’s son because he had a broken leg. The neighbor came by and said, “That’s wonderful.”
And the farmer said, “You never know.”

And so it goes.”