Colum McCann Quotes

The timeless moment. - The "moment" has no yesterday or tomorrow. It is not the result of thought and therefore has no time.

Try as they may to savor the taste of eternity, their thoughts still twist and turn upon the ebb and flow of things in past and future time. But if only their minds could be seized and held steady, they would be still for a while and, for that short moment, they would glimse the splendor of eternity, which is forever still.

The truth is that you can only come to know God when you give up the past and the future in your mind and merge totally into the now, because God is always here now.

I have realized that the past and future are real illusions, that they exist in the present, which is what there is and all there is.

The present moment is the only time that is eternal and the only time in which we can experience happiness.

To live with God is to live always in the present, with him who is the eternal Now.

The river is everywhere at the same time . . . everywhere and the present only exists for it, not the shadow of the past, nor the shadow of the future.

He who lives in the present lives in eternity.

Where, except in the present, can the eternal be met?

Spirituality tells the seeker not to live in the hoary past, not to live in the remote future, but to live in the immediacy of today, in the eternal Now.

My friend, the sufi is the friend of the present moment. To say tomorrow is not our way.

find your eternity in each moment

One realm we have never conquered: the pure present.

On the surface it seems that the present moment is only one of many, many moments. Each day of your life appears to consist of thousands of moments where different things happen. Yet if you look more deeply, is there not only one moment, ever? Is life ever not this moment? This one moment, now, is the only thing you can never escape from. The one constant factor in your life. No matter what happens. No matter how much your life changes. One thing is certain. Its always now. Since there is no escape from the now, why not welcome it, become friendly with it.

Nowness or the magic of the present moment is what joins the wisdom of the past with the present

The reality consists only of now, the present. It has nothing to do with the past and nothing to do with the future. It is so concentrated in this moment that if you can be in this moment, all that you are seeking and searching will be fulfilled. This moment is the door to the divine.

Solitude is not something you must hope for in the future. Rather, it is a deepening of the present, and unless you look for it in the present you will never find it.

Listen to the silence. Listen to your life. Be present, not just think about what's going on next week, next month.

God isn't present in the past or future. The great 'I Am' is in the present moment. When I claim that presence, I can get through anything today.

Peace is when time doesn't matter as it passes by.

God is a God of the present. God is always in the moment, be that moment hard or easy, joyful and painful.

I have always wanted to live in the present and never the past.

Time is an illusion. Time only exists when we think about the past and the future. Time doesn't exist in the present here and now.

The more you live in the present moment, the more the fear of death disappears.

If the present is really all we have, then the present lasts forever.