A rich man from a large city once visited a village. After seeing the village he felt that the people were poor there, so let him donate some money to each family. He organised a big camp and publicised about it. He was expecting a long queue, but to his surprise nobody turned up at the distribution commencement time. After some time one fellow came but some people came running behind him and took him away not allowing him to accept donation.
Actually, this village had a tradition of not accepting anything without doing something in return. When the same man opened an industry there offering jobs, there was a long queue to apply for the jobs.
Service means doing what others want not what we want.
Q: Why is my mind not in the present moment and how to bring my mind to the present moment 24×7?
A: In modern fast life too much Rajas (activity) could be the major reason for the existence of the habit of living in head. There could be too many tasks in, “To do” list made by your mind and it wants to jump from one task to another quickly. In this case your mind is always looking for, “What next?” and it may even treat a particular task as an obstacle that needs to be got rid of. Perhaps your mind wants to prove something to somebody or your mind is programmed from childhood to do too much work and not to rest etc. You need to do self inquiry to find out the real cause of this attitude applicable in your case, to slow down and to concentrate on doing one thing at a time .
While self inquiry is the fastest method of purification, Karma Yoga attitude is also very effective to mellow down Rajas.
