This week’s podcast is from my interview with Rachel Krantz and her wonderful podcast, “Help Existing.”

This week I'm talking with meditation teacher Jonathan Foust about the tendency of the mind to live in the future. Whether it's fantasizing or mundane planning, I know I often find my mind off in the future. Its underlying cause is an overdeveloped impulse to find pleasure and avoid danger and discomfort. Future thinking is impossible (and ill-advised) to avoid entirely --but I would like to learn to reign it in so that I can be more present in my life.

At the same time, as we talk about in this episode, future thinking has a purpose: it can alert us to what we're anxious about, where we might be headed in life, and what we value. What I got out of this conversation is that it's about learning how to work with it skillfully. This episode provides many practical tips for exercises that might help you do that.

You may remember Jonathan from last season's episode "Help Figuring Out the Most Important Thing."  I often turn to Jonathan for some of life's biggest questions. He's so wise, and I've found his podcast and YouTube channel extremely helpful.