The only way to live life is what now. When someone in life shows you what now and you’re waiting for what then, what happens is when they show you what then, you’re back to waiting for what now really is.

The only way to live life is in the now, in the what now.

When someone is showing you now, the problem is we fall into stories about relationships.

We’re constantly thinking about what somebody will be or what they will become with our love, support, and guidance.

It’s how we are as human beings.

We want to see the good in somebody.

We want to help somebody realize their potential.

Want to help people through a crisis.

But the problem is with all good intentions comes a price you’re going to pay.

So many of us spend so much time thinking about what somebody is going to be instead of who they really are.

You see, what you see in somebody right now is exactly who they are. Granted, they may become bigger, and stronger, and more powerful, and more amazing in the future, but what if they don’t?

Most of the times, people don’t become what you want them to become.

Why don’t they become that?

Because they actually like being who they are.

There’s nothing wrong with it to them.

Their addictions.

Their faults.

Their lack of taking action on things that drives you nuts.

The way they have sex.

The way they touch.

The way they talk.

Problem is, in life, most of us don’t practice abundance.

One of the greatest lessons my crazy mom told me was this — I don’t remember it verbatim because it was a long time ago, when I was 19.

My mother told me, when my ex-girlfriend, Kris, broke up with me, high school love, the girl I thought I would be with forever and ever:

My mother looked at me and said, what you have now is exactly what you have. You have a girl that doesn’t want to be with you, doesn’t want to grow with you. It’s done. The journey is over.

There’s going to be somebody out there that will love you so much more, so you need to just allow and let go.

The story has changed, but the meaning has always been the exact same, and it’s taught me a lot about life.

You see, in life I have been involved in what now and the what’s next a lot.

There’s a woman I went out with and I kept thinking about what she would be like under my tutelage, how she would be calmer and more aware. I worked on her, and I helped her, and every day she showed me what now was. What next never came.

The problem is we want to see the good in people, but in turn what we’re doing is we’re depriving ourselves of relationships that we really should be in.

What now is all we have, and what we have is what somebody is presenting through themselves in the now.

I changed the way that I date.

I date in the what now, not in what I want somebody to be.

When someone new shows up in my life, I’m just very present to who they are.

I listen so carefully to what they say.

I allow them to show me who they really are.

I don’t want to get to know the representative, I want to get to know who they really are.

And through that discovery process, by stating present, I actually either fall in love with who they are or I allow them to go back into the pool of dating, back into the universe, and find somebody who suits them better.

I’m no longer falling in love with the idea of what I want somebody to be.

I’m falling in love with who the person really is.

No more stories anymore.

I know what I want and I know what I want to feel. And it’s okay if this person and I do not feel that together.

It’s okay if this person doesn’t want to accomplish things that I think they want to do. I’m just accepting them for exactly who they are.

Where did I learn that lesson? I learned it from being a dad.

Stay connected to the what now instead of what’s next.