Each moment is passing

In a world ruled by transience, there is no reason to mourn the passing of things but accepting each encounter as a revelation. Homer says in Iliad, 'Like generations of leaves, the lives of mortal men. The old leaves wither as new buds burst forth on trees. And so, with men, one generation comes to life, another dies away.'

Marcus Aurelius, philosopher emperor, asks, 'Canst thou take a bath unless the wood undergoes a change? Canst thou be nourished unless the food undergoes a change? Dost thou not see then that for thyself and to change is just the same and equally necessary for the universal nature?' We admire the beauty of a butterfly but rarely acknowledge the changes it has undergone to attain that beauty.

Giving full attention to each interaction allows us to experience the wide variety of people and occasions that come our way. Everyone has the power to bring value to our lives, even those we will not meet again. This is the philosophy of ichi-go ichi-e by li Naosuke, a Japanese tea master, who embraced impermanence of life.


The past is the most tragic of all tenses; if it was happy, it is gone; if unhappy, it cannot be amended. The present is all that matters, as all possibilities are alive. Each moment is passing; it is singular and unrepeatable. Therefore, we need to live every moment like children without anticipation or foreboding, with excited sense of not knowing what will happen, and undiluted joy.