Have you ever wished you could be present again the way a child is? In this episode, I dive into the power of being present and strategies you can use to get in the moment. 🎧AIRPODS MAX GIVEAWAY🎧 To enter to win the Airpods Max with an "If Then Podcast" engraving, here's what to do: 1) Screenshot this podcast and share on your Instagram tagging @ifthenpodcast 2) Follow @ifthenpodcast on Instagram 3) If we get to 200 shares by the end of Season 2, you have an opportunity to win the Airpods Max! But don't forget, that each week, for those of you who share on Instagram, I also give away two 1 month Audible gift cards which include a FREE credit for an audiobook + 1 MONTH ACCESS to their Plus Catalog which includes thousands of audiobooks with no credits needed. WEBSITE: https://www.ifthenpodcast.com EMAIL: [email protected] CREDITS: Written and produced by Jordan Taylor The video I use to practice my focus: https://youtu.be/R5UHvRtvV1c TRANSCRIPT: My name is Jordan Taylor, and welcome to the If Then podcast. Our brains our a conglomerate of if/then statements, like in computer code, and oftentimes new lines of code are hard to write in our mind when we’re trying new things, for example if I want to play piano, then I need to read music. Sitting down and coding that particular if then statement could take years of dedication, but when we do sit down and create new then statements for a complicated if, it feels freaking amazing. This podcast is your weekly motivation, and mine, to get uncomfortable and write some neurological code. “If you are depressed you are living in the past. If you are anxious you are living in the future. If you are at peace you are living in the present.” - Lao Tzu *The sound of kids running* It took all summer, but we had finally turned the yard to dust. It billowed from our steps and a football thrown, a car hood slammed with an incomplete end zone pass to the driveway. A dent was made, or was that already there? Dad would make the final call on that later. We huddled up. Neighbor against neighbor in a daily summer skirmish and there were no screens or beeps or past or future. There were just smiles and eyes and movement. And us, and the dust. The ball launched again, this time short and complete with a juke and shimmy and a two hand touch. Soon, the sun was quenched, and with it, our thirst as we downed water on the front porch watching the sunset. And we sat. We just sat and watched and talked and were together—in the moment. And we had no idea how valuable it was. When I was a kid, there was only one thing—the moment. I had no past I could remember and my future was too far away to envision. I was there. Just right there with no distractions, just a sponge and a football soaking in every second and waiting, just waiting for the opportunity to squeeze out and apply its lessons, and then soak again. And then squeeze until the waters grew me, and then I found myself older with new kids on the field of life, bulky Past and weighty Future and with them, complex thoughts and distractions that thickened like a fog on the field as they blitzed and rushed me with the snap of the ball. And then the game was sealed with a mid-game substitution from flip phone to smart. More foggy distractions, and I didn’t stand a chance. I was blitzed so fast, sacked so hard, and injured and then the game ended and those summers did too. “The moment” I knew so well, faded and was gone.  *music* Have you ever just stopped and tried to be in the moment and not think? Like, really, just tried to think of nothing and just be present, with no external or internal stimuli affecting you— just solely focused on the now like a child? If you try this, you’ll notice something. Thoughts come to the front of your brain like waves on the beach. “I need to take out the trash, did I pay that bill, I wonder what she’s thinking of me, who’s that texting me?” You’ll