Grounding Yourself In the Present Moment

My point main point of being against grounding yourself in the present was that it seemed to be ignoring the past and the future, (equally important aspects of life). It seems you agree that such a way of life is "very tiring and pointless" however that is not the way you presented it in your opening round. You presented it as if we should only regard the present, as you said: "Poisons linking yourself to your future is the fear concept. Demons of your soul, corrupting you sanity for clever lies. You don't need it." and, "The past, a dragging sensation, stopping you form being free in the only moment of life, the present moment." From this I deduced that you meant that we should only concentrate on the present and forget the rest. Of course the present is the only time where you can take action and I am all for taking action but where can the motivation for this action come from without thinking on the past and future? We either have the motivation to take action from past failures/lessons or the desire for a better future. Again this incorporates all three tenses of life. You say that fear only exists in thoughts of the future but is a little fear not good? You are only neglecting fear on one example here, the approaching a woman one so the motivation for grounding yourself in the present can not be solely based on one example where fear would be evident otherwise. However I do argue that fear is good for us. The right amount of fear can be a powerful motivator. Doing important exams for example, is it really more beneficial to ground yourself in the present when studying for important exams? I think not, especially when it comes to motivation. If while studying for these exams you have fear of failing then that is motivating you to do well as opposed to grounding yourself in the present which is essentially just saying not to worry. This is incorporating the future as a motivator as opposed to no apparent motivation coming out of rounding yourself in the present. To go back to your approaching a woman example, you say that what you think makes you do the things you do however there must be motivation/reasoning for every action we do, no matter how small. You have failed to give how grounding yourself in the present actually MOTIVATES a person to approach a woman. Incorporating the past and future does however. We can again only be motivated by past failures/lessons or by thinking of the future benefits of the action in question, approaching a woman in this case. You say that we would have to act on this in the present but where does this desire to act come from? For example it could either be something like (1) because I was too afraid last time but I have learned from that (past) or (2) Because it would be great to get to know this woman etc. in the future or (3) A mix of both. In the case of (3) it would be learning from the past and taking those lessons into the present for means of an improved future. Thus incorporating and using all aspects of life in a positive manner even if the past experience felt negative at the time. This is why I feel this is a superior way to life than staying in the present. I see that you agree with me that we can learn from the past however you say, "because of that unchanging quality of the Past we can always look back for answers and by doing it, we learn from it, we educate ourselves." Surely looking back into the past is not grounding yourself in the present moment? What you have said here coincides more with my argument. Also yes the future is uncertain but we shouldn't neglect it's possibilities as we don't go through life thinking that we might die tomorrow or get hit by a bus etc. We think of future often when making decisions/taking action as it is often a good motivator. The point of the three steps I mentioned was to show the benefits of using all aspects of life rather than just the present. In that case I took an inventor's life so I will use the 3 steps coming from a much broader scale; an ordinary person going through life. I think it is much more beneficial for a person to go through life, 1. Using the past to obtain knowledge for the present. 2. Incorporating this knowledge into the present. 3. Maintaining this knowledge for the future. In the case of a great mind such as an inventor, an idea would have to be 1. Obtained from past knowledge. 2. Conceived in the present. (By conceived I meant put into practice). 3. Thought of how it will benefit the future. I agree that the past is known, the future is unknown and the present is both however I fail to see the argument in this? You say that "the only way to access both the Known and the Unknown is by being in the the Present where you can use the knowledge from your past to your advantage along with the pure creativity that the future inspires." This sounds like my argument exactly. Surely reflecting on past lessons for knowledge and thinking of the future is NOT grounding yourself in the present. I don't see how using the past along with the creativity that the future inspires coincides with grounding yourself in the present. Again I reiterate that in your opening round you say: "Poisons linking yourself to your future is the fear concept. Demons of your soul, corrupting you sanity for clever lies. You don't need it. The past, a dragging sensation, stopping you form being free in the only moment of life, the present moment." I am not sure why you seem to be altering your apparent initial stance on the issue?