John Wooden focused almost entirely on improvement in the present moment. He let the score—winning—take care of itself. Don't let yesterday take up too much of today.

Guess what? When it comes right down to it, wherever you go, there you are. Whatever you wind up doing, that's what you've wound up doing. Whatever you are thinking right now, that's what's on your mind. Whatever has happened to you, it has already happened. The important question is, how are you going to handle it? In other words, "Now what?

To allow ourselves to be truly in touch with where we already are, no matter where that is, we have got to pause in our experience long enough to let the present moment sink in; long enough to actually feel the present moment, to see it in its fullness, to hold it in awareness and thereby come to know and understand it better.

We take care of the future best by taking care of the present now.

and remind you that you are here now, and that when you get there, you will be there. If you miss the here, you are likely also to miss the there. If your mind is not centered here, it is likely not to be centered just because you arrive somewhere else.

The only way we have of influencing the future is to own the present, however we find it.

Meditation is a way of being, not a technique. Meditation is not about trying to get anywhere else. It is about allowing yourself to be exactly where you are and as you are, and the world to be exactly as it is in this moment, as well.

in meditation practice, the best way to get somewhere is to let go of trying to get anywhere at all.

If we are to grasp the reality of our life while we have it, we will need to wake up to our moments. Otherwise, whole days, even a whole life, could slip past unnoticed.

There were times when I could not afford to sacrifice the bloom of the present moment to any work, whether of the head or hand.

To break out of this trap of always being driven by our own desires, it is not a bad exercise to ask yourself from time to time, "What is my own way?" "What do I really want?" "Would I know it if I got it?" "Does everything have to be perfect right now, or under my total control right now, for me to be happy?

It's not a matter of letting go—you would if you could. Instead of Let it go, we should probably say Let it be.