Troubles of the past are no more than troubled thoughts of the past. The past is misbegotten. And the past is illusory. Desist bringing the past into the present. It is an exercise in futility. You can never win this game you play. Lose the past, and keep today viable and vibrant. Chew the candy that life offers you today. When you come across old candy, throw it away. It had its time, but now that time is past. Get some fresh candy today.

When you are at the cinema or watching a movie on TV, you do not ask the projectionist to reel off an old movie. You want to look at the movie that is right before you. An old movie may have been wonderful, or it may have been scary. In any case, it isn't the movie playing now. You want to live in more than memory. Memory is only a thought. It is reflection. You can have the real thing now.

Why would you choose anything but today's meal made fresh for you? Would you really choose last week's stew or a meal from ten years ago?

Today is what is offered to you. You'd better take it. Hold out your hand and accept today as the gift it is. It is like no other gift. Even if you happen to think all days are the same, you are mistaken. You really know better. Today provides for you. It is your provision. Even yesterday is past. You can't catch a train that has passed. You can only catch the one that is coming now. Step onto the real train that is available to you today.

You may have had a lovely train ride in the past, but what good is it to you today? It left you long ago. Why would you hang on to that which has let go of you? Memories can be delightful, and yet so can today be. You may let today go past you only to pick it up later in reverie. Pick it up now while it is hot.

Sometimes the past seems more real to you than this minute right now. That can only be because you are paying more attention to the past. Whatever attention you pay to the past, it is misplaced. Why see yourself in a mirror of the past when there is a mirror right before you now?

What makes the past so precious to you? Soon enough today will be past. Make it precious while it is malleable before you now.

Is a faded bloom more precious than the flower you can pick now? Who says it is? You must say it is. Tomorrow's memory can be today's joy.

No matter how well-preserved the past is, it has been preserved. Fresh fruit is juicy. Do you really feel that dried fruit is worth more than fresh? Drink the fresh juice that today offers. Today is abundant. The past is sparse. An apple tree from the past does not give you fruit to pick today.

What is it, beloveds, that tends to make the past more precious to you than this minute right now? Cannot this very moment be precious as you live it?

What is it that the past offers you that you fear the present does not? Is a bird at hand not worth two in the past? Surely you don't consider Me absent from the present? Do you think life itself mellows more with age? Or that I do?

Beloveds, I am ageless. Life is not cheese that is better aged, nor is it wine better aged. Life is better fresh off the vine.