Perhaps the greatest benefit civilization has offered man is the ability to plan in a far more comprehensive and precise manner, making it possible not only to guard against adversity but also to project himself into the future with some degree of certainty, calculating the circumstances he will face depending on his actions. To project, to prevent: these verbs have become ingrained in his psyche, taking up much of the space once occupied by others of immediate consequence. One can already see where all this leads. The man of today lives, to a much greater extent, in the future; and lives less in the present, whether due to lesser need or lesser inclination. And here, evidently, lies a problem, which makes it extremely difficult to grasp the meaning of what the Indian sages have been repeating for centuries.