I never felt I’d post this topic because it’s a part of life that I had never really understood before. Sometimes during moments of happiness, when I’m feeling most content, surrounded by loved ones or in moments of reflection, I experience some sort of emotional conflict. Even during some previous relationships, I’d encounter a feeling that my mind is drifting into an unknown alternate reality, where I’m overcome by a feeling of loss; sometimes hit with a slight panic or sadness, even though nothing has occurred to reason the emotion. It’s like I’ve disconnected with my present and it’s very bizarre.

I spoke to an old co-worker of mine, from my life in New York because I always remembered how spiritual she was and how obsessed she was with astrology. So to gain insight I sought out her advice. She suggested that maybe it was my past life trying to remind me of something, or perhaps a glimpse into an event that may occur in my future. Although an interesting perspective, it wasn’t a reason I felt comfortable with. Call me a skeptic, but I had to come up with a more rational explanation. However, she wasn’t totally wrong, her insight triggered my understanding; by looking into my past and confronting my hesitations about the future.

When I meet key moments in my life, when life seems to be working out and when things are simply right, I sometimes can’t help feel that I’m about to lose something. That somewhere down the line some sort of loss may occur: losing a loved one, losing money, losing control or even losing my passion for my work. There were many scenarios in which I could potentially encounter loss so my mind would trigger feelings associated with it, even though no loss had taken place. Loss was perceived, it was like I was anticipating some sort of universal balance as a result of things working out in my life.

I reckon this occurred because of one of the following two reasons:

1. Preparing for Contingencies (known): Every direction I take in my life I have carefully calculated, by doing my research and planning for any contingencies, things I know that could go wrong. I can’t help it, I’m a marketer so it sort of happens innately.  So experiencing emotions in anticipation for a loss became a coping mechanism. So if loss was to occur, I’d be prepared, I‘d be ready to handle it, because I was taking care of it emotionally, ahead of time.

2. Waiting for Failure (unknown): All of us have jumped hurdles in life, minor or major, every person knows that the road to success isn’t a direct route; we hit dead ends, wrong turns and encounter forks along the way. My feelings of loss stemmed from my past experiences, causing the doubt and disbelief in my present and an uncertainty for my future. Not knowing all the details of what could occur made me look into my past losses and we all know that a trip down memory lane can trigger an array of emotions we can’t seem to understand today.

What I had to do was retrain my mind to think in the present. A “what will be, will be” sort of attitude. I may be able to construct and direct my life but there are definitely elements beyond my control. I had to be okay with that and learn the importance of accepting the moment. I continue to remind myself like many others, that life has its funny way of fu***** us around from time to time. Therefore I shouldn’t live my life failing to appreciate the present, because I’m idly waiting for loss to occur. It’s a waste of energy leading to a breakdown of my identity.

The funny thing I noticed was, only when we suffer loss do we generally motivate the spirit to “live in the moment,” why wait for loss to occur when we can make that pledge now and “seize the day.” I decided to beat loss at its game and continually remind myself to be present and to look forward to the positive outcomes of my future. A failure to be present today makes for a loss of presence in the future. Sometimes, as we work forward to the life we design, we charge so fast that we make ruins of the memories we create. We have to stop and capture every moment as it happens, rather than letting the fragments of doubt spoil our chances to live.