I am here now.
I am present now. I am the watcher now.
Just watch. Just watch. Just watch your breath.
Watch your frustration. The prickle of irritation that starts in your right temple and rises up your spine.
Just watch your distraction. The feeling you get looking at your elderly cat. Just watch the discomfort of admitting you have an elderly cat. Watch the fear of admission. Watch the fear of telling the truth. Watch the fear of ... Watch the love boiling over in your heart, foaming like a giant pot of pasta overflowing. You could cry at any second you love this cat so much. Just watch. You could cry at any second.

Watch the breath get stuck in your stomach, watch the inhale that is so hard to reach your belly.

Just watch the fear of aging. Watch the mispellings and typos, watch the thought wondering if they are kratom induced.

Watch yourself pick up the glass of water, grateful yet fearful that city water supply won't last.

Just watch yourself need to space out and watch the shapes floating across your vision. Watch yourself remind yourself of a character in a book you can't remember the name of. Watch your breath get stuck again, try to breathe deeply again, still not a complete breath. Shallow. Watch yourself feeling shallow. Watch the despair. Watch the attachment. Watch yourself reaching for another capsule so late at night.

Watch yourself feeling guilty for not being inspired to work on printables. Always wanting to contribute, but that feeling leads to more stuckness.

Watch the common thread of feeling stuck. Watch yourself stuck. Stuck in what? Dust. Mud. Fear.

Watch yourself listening to the music, swaying frantically with kratom energy and anxiety and actual enjoyment of the song. Watch yourself remember to breathe out more fully. Watch yourself keep breathing out. Still breathing out.

Watch the frustration that comes when you make a typo but finally catch a complete breath. Watch the words flow out because you're watching, not thinking. Watch yourself space out again. Keep watching. Just watch.

Watch the world get an extra dimension, like a mirror was added in a fun house to make one more angle of infinite reflections.

Watch yourself unconsciously remember to breathe out fully, deeply. Remembering how to breathe just by watching. Watch the typo frustration. This frustration at being unable to quickly tell the world what you think. Unable to get the words out as fast as you can observe. The frustration of finally catching a whif of inspiration, and then not being able to keep up.

Watch that feeling of not being able to keep up. This feeling is key. Watch the feeling of wanting to cry because others are ahead of you. Watch the feeling of feeling inadequate and not enough. Watch the feeling of doubting yourself. Watch the desire to be more popular. Watch the self criticism.

Watch yourself stretch your neck out. Watch the quiet pop. Watch yourself searching for more poetic terms. Remembering to breathe out fully once again. Seeing the floaters in your vision appear every time you space out for a moment.

Watch yourself feel relieved that you were able to write over 500 words without a prompt. Watch yourself feel relieved to have a bit of creativity return. Watch the shift in your attitude. Watch yourself notice the tense pain in your left elbow. Watch your attention reach out to the sounds in the hallway, bracing for interruption. Watch yourself paint a mask on your face so that your emotion is unclear. Watch yourself put up a protective shield. Watch yourself notice that pain or tenseness in your elbow again.

Watch yourself remember finishing reading that book, even though you skimmed the last chapter. Watch yourself justify the skimming to yourself. Watch yourself have a faint conversation laughing about what's wrong with that book. Watch yourself remember to breathe out completely. Keep exhaling> Forcing the exhale.

Watch yourself thinking about how proud of yourself you are for finishing a nonfiction book that inspired you and actually influenced your behavior. Watch yourself feeling inspired to make something that can do that for others. Watch yourself notice the trail of inspiration. Watch yourself notice the flashing gchat tab. Watch yourself debate how long to take to answer since you're in a flow and don't want to go. Watch yourself tell yourself that answering can be in the flow too.

Watch yourself second guess yourself. Watch yourself get annoyed at the song because the vocals are too repetitive. Watch yourself reach into your pocket for the last capsule of the day. Watch yourself worry about how late your period is. Watch yourself get really anxious about your late period. Watch yourself try to soothe yourself. Watch yourself try to breathe deeply and fail. Watch yourself worry about covid. Watch yourself think about red scare and feel better because they don't take anything seriously. They take airplanes.

Watch the tears well up again because you're feeling a little better. Watch yourself get distracted by 3 thoughts at once, remembering none. Watching yourself remember to exhale completely again. Keep exhaling. Keep going. Force it out.

Watch yourself inhale deeply but still not completely. Watch yourself feel a little dizzy from all the effort. Watch yourself realize that it probably shouldn't be this difficult, you're just a little too worried about it.

Watch yourself watch yourself worry. Watch yourself detach a little more, focus a littler tighter. Watch that the typos don't bring up so much frustration now. Watch yourself breathe slowly. Watch yourself exhale slowly, not concerned about a complete breath.

Watch yourself breathe in. Watch yourself breathe out. Watch yourself remembering that the goal is just to notice the breath, not force it one way or another. Watch yourself correct yourself to say, the goal is to follow the breath.

Watch yourself get another anxiety spike. Watch yourself worry about your health. Watch yourself remember your college attitude of FUCK IT who knows how long I got left. Watch yourself feel nostalgic and longing for that fuck it attitude. Really not caring. Really being careless. Watch yourself notice the taste in your mouth. Gummy aftertaste and smoke and worry.

Watch yourself effortlessly write over 1000 words, without feeling bored or cliched. Watch yourself long for something good to listen to. Watch yourself listening to the sounds in the hallway again. Watch yourself wonder what she's doing. Watch yourself admire her for her art and her dedication to craft. Watch yourself feel so much love for this other half of you. Watch yourself look at her like a precious heart shaped gem stone locket. Watch yourself remember to not get too attached to that feeling. That's how you've kept her all this time.

Watch yourself swallow and run your tongue over your lips. Watch yourself inhale. Watch yourself wonder about if travel is in your future. Watch yourself really want to turn on some music. Watch yourself decide on the classics: belfast radio on pandora. Watch yourself feel gratitude for being able to afford pandora.

Watch yourself wonder what you'll do when you go upstairs since you just finished your book. Watch yourself remember you spent over 6 hours on your phone today. Watch yourself flicker onto the thought that you don't have instagram installed, and be happy about it. Watch yourself skate over the instagram idea, it looks brown and shiny, like a boring imovie icon I don't ever want to open.

Watch yourself feel excited about this writing. Watch yourself wonder how this practice can translate into just presence without the writing component. Watch yourself feel a little irritated because you don't know what to do when you're done writing. Watch yourself remember the autism discourse on twitter. Watch yourself feel annoyed you missed the inception of the drama. Watch yourself beat yourself up for caring about twitter drama. Watch yourself get annoyed at the song for the water droplet, squirt noises.

Thumbs down.

Watch yourself suddenly feel like a poet because you can describe what you're watching. Watch yourself be totally conscious, that's the goal. Watch yourself think about how presence is the opposite of addiction. Watch yourself space out, questioning your own addictions and how the fuck is presence gonna get me off this shit.

Watch yourself feel mildly relieved at the thought of a natural remedy for that situation, when it comes. Watch yourself feel anxious about the future and possible travel. Watch yourself flicker onto thinking about the virus. Watch yourself turn quickly away because it really doesn't help to think about it.

Watch yourself reach for the la croix but it's already gone, in the recycling. Also known as "garbage #2" because it goes to the landfill too.

Watch yourself feel deep pain for the environment and long to help. Watch yourself realize you never thumbs downed. Watch yourself remember that humans are inconsequential in the long term. Watch yourself feel compassion and empathy for animals. Watch yourself breathe in. Watch yourself remember to breathe out completely.

Watch yourself glad you didn't thumbs down because now there is a fiddle and it goes nice with the squish bass line.