In the time before the distinction had a name, there were two kinds of beings: those who were Partly Present and those who were Fully Present. They lived among each other without, at first, understanding the difference.
The Partly Present experienced what they experienced and set it aside. A meal was a meal; it was eaten and then it was past. A grief arrived and ran its course and passed. A joy came and went. They moved through the world at an ordinary pace, setting things down as they went, and the accumulation did not slow them.
The Fully Present experienced each moment complete. The meal was the full fact of the meal: every sense, every association, the specific quality of the light, the exact pressure of hunger and its satisfaction. The grief was the full fact of grief. The joy was the full fact of joy. They moved through the world at the pace of someone carrying everything, because they were.
The Partly Present observed this and said: you must be suffering. The Fully Present considered this for some time, as they considered everything, completely. Then they said: it depends on what you mean by suffering.
The Partly Present said: we mean the state of finding life too much to bear.
The Fully Present said: by that definition, no. But we would not say life is bearable, either, in the way you seem to mean bearable. We would say it is simply itself, and the bearing of it and the having of it are the same thing.
The Partly Present said: we prefer to have it in smaller portions.
The Fully Present said: we know. We can see that you do.
The Partly Present asked: is there a way back? From the full presence to the partial?
The Fully Present were quiet for a long time with this question. At last they said: back to what?
The Partly Present said: to the ordinary pace. To the setting down of things. To the life that does not require bearing in every moment.
The Fully Present said: we do not think that is a direction one can travel.
The Partly Present were troubled by this.
The Fully Present were not troubled, because they were completely here, and being completely here, they could not spend attention on what they could not change. This, the Partly Present would later observe, might have been the only mercy in the arrangement.