“To everything there is a season and a time
to every purpose under heaven.”
Ecclesiastes

The weekend of January 23rd, 2009 I was in charge of the food for a black belt test in Pukulan, an intensive Indonesian martial art. The test lasted for 48 hours, and it was my job to provide meals for about 30 black belts presiding over it during that time.

This was 5 days after I realized I was psychic, and I was in the full throes of what I term my “psychic awakening”. I hadn’t eaten or slept for several days, and I was on a constant energy high. Experiences I now take for granted were brand new at the time and I had no context for my newfound awareness.

Blown open in this way, and with a job to do, I fell into flow. I lost all sense of time, everything that needed to happen existed in a single moment. I remember laying down on the floor at home because it was time to lay down on the floor, then making biscuits because it was time to make biscuits. I traveled to and from the school on the whim of my inner guidance. There was no question of if I wanted to do something, or if it should or shouldn’t be done. There was no plan and no strategy. I did something only because it was time to do it.

At the end of the weekend a black belt pulled me aside and told me that I had done an exceptional job. He said every time any of them thought, “I wish I had…” I would walk in at that exact moment with the food in question. I was so in the present and attentive to the needs of the present I excelled at my work without thinking about it.

Nine years later the lessons of that weekend have stayed with me. Entering 2018 I realized there was only one intention I could set for this year. It is to ask the question that gave me perfect timing:

What does this moment need?

To answer this question truthfully the ego has to make a lot of sacrifices. It cannot hold onto expectations about what should or shouldn’t happen. It cannot plan ahead because each moment is never the same. There has to be an openness to the unknown and a willingness to be inconvenienced.

For example, I once was driving and meditating on this question. I had a strong impulse to stop and go into a bookstore I was driving by. I had no reason to do this but the urge was so strong I had to stop. When I did I found a homeless woman outside with a sign that said “Need $9 for shelter tonight”. I checked my wallet and had a ten dollar bill. Again, there was no choice, I gave her the money and felt my reason for stopping was fulfilled. I went on my way.

You’ll notice these stories are rooted in service. That’s because when we tune into the moment we stop worrying about ourselves so much. We normally base our lives in trying to answer, “How can I get what I need?” When we change the question from “how can I get” to “what can I give”, all the needs of the moment are fulfilled, including our own. That weekend I spent at the test involved me taking naps and doing other self care that I’d been neglecting. Caring for myself became part of the rhythm of my work so I never became overwhelmed.

As I’ve focused more on what the moment needs these last few weeks I’ve found it to be the perfect antidote to worry. I now have a two month old daughter Annabelle (see announcement below), and juggling her care while I return to work is its own special challenge. I found myself attempting to clean the kitchen one morning while caring for a fussy baby. My mind at the same time started thinking about all the other things I had to do and anxiety that I’d be able to get anything done.

So I stopped myself, asked what the moment needed, and sat down to nurse my baby. By the time I finished my mother was available to watch her, and I was able to finish cleaning. When I was done Annabelle was sleeping and I did the rest of the work that had been on my mind.

What had felt like too much became extremely simple and easy when I dropped into the moment. I sat down, relaxed, and attended to one thing when it felt like I needed to do a dozen. This opened up the energy flow and allowed the miracle of timing to work for me, so I got everything done when worry had told me it was impossible.

When you listen to the needs of the moment, you connect into the natural rhythm of time. You can focus your effort on a direction, as I did with the black belt test, and you will flow naturally into attending to everything required by the project. You can open it up as a general idea and end up helping someone unexpectedly, like when I stopped at the bookstore. You can also draw at it at any moment you start to feel overwhelmed and it will both simplify and organize your life for you, as I have found repeatedly these last few months as I adjust to raising a child.

Time is an abundant force of nature. Align with it and you will give freely to yourself and others. It won’t be a thought, it will be a way of being.

More information on this intuitive way of being will be presented in my class, “Beyond Positive Thinking: How Manifestation Really Works”.