Whenever there is a crisis of any type, time seems to slow.
You may sit around a hospital waiting room for fourteen hours, having forgotten to eat, feeling your jeans becoming looser and your mind more focused. Suddenly, what was so important yesterday—the stain on your new white blouse, the missed dental appointment, the squeaky noise the car makes—is irrelevant. Everything but the object of attention loses meaning.
When there is a crisis, everything stops, and this provides room for living and focus, at least in those hours. It thrusts people into the “now” to which they often aspire with the use of meditation tools or forced attention.
When a crisis occurs, living in the now happens naturally.
Of course, few would ask for the object of the crisis, even with the gifts the crisis brings. It is nice to focus, but the crises often contains incidents of grief, sadness, and discomfort. Still, once the shock is over and life goes back to normal or at least what is considered as the first ordinary day, the leftover gifts can help us to create more authentic and productive lives.