Don’t follow past thoughts, don’t anticipate the future, and don’t follow illusory thoughts that arise in the present; but turning within, observe your own true nature and maintain awareness of your natural mind, just as it is, beyond the conceptual limitations of past, present, and future.
— Garab Dorje, the earliest Dzogchen master.
(Photo by AlicePopkorn)
People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.
— Albert Einstein
Why? Because now is all that is. The past, the present, and the future, all is contained in this moment, now.
How? What you think as past is nothing but your recollection, from your memories, of what you suppose to have happened. It’s not real, it doesn’t exist now, it’s only your memories. And what you think as future is your imagination. Right now it exists only in your mind, otherwise it is not real. The present is the only time that comes close to real, present is what you perceive to be happening right now, and even all recollection (of the past) and all imagination (of the future) can happen in your mind only in the present moment.
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(Photo by Thorsten)
What in fact is the past? The past is not a reality; it’s just a concept. The future corresponds to projections, anticipations that do not have any reality either. The past has already occurred; the future does not yet exist. These notions affect us as realities, although they have no substance. The present is the truth that we are experiencing here and now, but it is an elusive reality that does not last. We find ourselves in a paradoxical situation in which the present constitutes a border, a limit between a past and a future without any concrete reality. The present is that elusive moment between what no longer exists and what has not yet happened.
These notions that we take as “reality” are pure intellectual fabrications that do not involve an independent reality, existent in itself. According to the Buddha, perceived phenomena exist only from the standpoint of their designation—that is, the names and concepts we attach to them. The functioning of phenomena does not reveal a palpable entity that is uniquely theirs. You could compare phenomena to a mirage: the closer you get to it, the farther away it gets, until it disappears. Similarly faced with the mind that analyzes them, phenomena vanish.
— Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama
(Photo by Éole Wind)
“I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”
— Jesus
“One cannot be spiritual as long as one has shame, hatred, or fear. … Great men have the nature of a child. They are always a child before God; so they are free from pride. All their strength is of God and not their own. It belongs to Him and comes from Him.”
— Ramakrishna
Be a child, free yourself from pride, free yourself from guilt. Free yourself from concepts and opinions you have about yourself. All past, even upto the last second, is gone, good or bad, it’s never going to come back. All those things people said or thought about you, opinions people had about you, good or bad, all is gone. The present moment is the only real time, the universe renews itself every moment. When you free your mind from the past, you give birth to yourself each moment, you join the flow of life, you are alive!
Be a child, be happy 
Photo by ValetheKid
Meditation is offering your genuine presence to yourself in every moment. It’s the capacity to recognize clearly that every moment is a gift of life, a gift from the Earth and sky.
— Thich Nhat Hanh
Picture by Seldom Scene Photography