By Jenn Lin

Featuring Duke the Pom. Story and images by Jenn Lin © May 2024, All Rights Reserved.

After a recent fetch session at the dog park with Duke, I couldn’t help but reflect on the topic of staying present. And I don’t just mean staying present when I’m out with my dog—I also mean staying present in my life, my work, and my relationships.

It’s happened countless times: we lost track of his tiny orange “Chuck It!” ball while playing fetch. Each time this happens, I do my best to circle the area I think it got lost in, sometimes retrieving it with success, but other times just feeling frustrated that I just wasted half an hour looking for it… I mean, how could this happen? Again?!

I know losing a ball is a common occurrence, and it’s a minor sunk cost at the end of the day. Even though Duke’s bound to get distracted and lose them repeatedly, I’m probably going to buy another 20 of these balls over his lifetime for our enjoyment. Despite this awareness, I still have the tendency to generate this little mental drama about losing his ball. Why? The truth is that the only thing we can do is enjoy whatever it is that we have while it’s here, in the present. And we can’t control what happens. So what if something didn’t turn out the way you hoped? You still get to decide how you feel about it.

All this from losing a dog ball? Yup.

While I was circling the field for this lost ball, I glanced over at Duke, who remained totally oblivious to what had happened. Duke was sniffing around in the field and enjoying himself… peeing on whatever he felt like. He wasn’t bothered in the slightest. He’d forgotten about his ball the moment he dropped it, because he had a million other smells in the park to keep himself occupied. And besides, he was out with the Greatest Dog Mom ever—so why would he care about this tiny little orange rubber ball? The world is truly abundant! Everything is freakin’ awesome!

After I left the park, resigned to the fact that the ball was lost, I decided that I was going to surrender. I was going to let go of the past and future, and accept the here and now. Without past and future there is no judgment, only what is. In the freedom of just being, I felt the negative emotions I was carrying fall away, replaced with the feeling of awe that I had learned another lesson from Duke.

Here’s where the story gets even better: a month later, Duke decided to run full speed into the tallest grass, 50 ft away, and drop his replacement ball as his nose picked up something more interesting. I would be saint if I told you that I didn’t feel any negativity about it. But, remembering what I had learned from the last time we were here, I eventually decided it was best to let it go and accept the fact that we had lost another one.

A couple days later, I happened to be at the same park again, feeling relaxed. I was about to leave when I saw a lady with a border collie hanging out around the section of the field that we had lost Duke’s ball in. Duke happens to like border collies because he loves being chased, so I decided to approach and say hi. We chatted a bit and then I told her about the tiny orange ball we had lost. She replied, “This one?” and pulled it out of her pocket.

And just like that, I received a gift. A synchronicity—a sign from the universe that I’m on the right path.

I want to end this story and leave you with something I heard divorce lawyer James Sexton say in a YouTube video: he said something like, “We are losing every thing and every one all of the time, so we may as well love them now.” Nothing is forever, but that doesn’t mean we should let that ruin the present moment or stop us from being loving.

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