Appreciating This Moment

This evening, I checked in with the online community of my class, only to find that the class was cancelled due to a technical issue. I had a night to catch up on my reading, eat grapes that I had left from my previous shopping, and simply enjoy a surfeit of free time that was unexpected. And, considering that I have had a few days off from work, I did feel truly rested. It was also helpful that I was outdoors yesterday, feeling the warm air and exercising.
   It's unfortunate that so much of my life is going through a series of tasks that I miss the occasional moments when there is only one or two things that need doing. I have to say that this experience often occurs as a result of an unexpected "freeing" of my schedule but there are also times when the body is very relaxed and I can focus more effectively. From a Buddhist perspective, however, such moments can even be cultivated in the time when one has many things to do, because the mind is not entangled in these successive confusing thoughts of having to do many things.
  I often think there is a lot to do, but that often happens only because I didn't cherish what I am doing presently, and appreciate it for what it's worth. Let's say, for instance, you have a stack of assignments to do. If you look at those assignments only from the perspective of things to be "done", then you have already committed to a time when they should be completed. Any thought in your mind that smacks of "not finished yet" is going to feel unsatisfying. However, if you treat each assignment like a really wonderful book you are reading or writing, the thought of getting it done will actually not feel so compelling. That's because you are simply enjoying the actual doing of the task, without worrying about whether it's finished or not. Savoring what needs doing now takes away from the sting of "not having things finished" as much as one originally planned.
   Another way of putting this, perhaps,is that the best way for time to pass is not to be aware of the time passing at all. How is this done? Part of it is to retrain one's mind to see that there is something in one's responsibilities that nobody else shares: it's entirely unique to you. Right now, I am taking a class in anti-oppression education, and isn't this wonderful? No matter whether I finish or not, I have this chance to learn something completely new in an area that can help other people. It can also help me to learn how to see things differently. No matter whether the assignments are finished, it's what I am learning and trying to digest that really matters, not so much the performance of the stated educational outcomes.