It is nearly impossible to leave your past until you find a future. And very few, until such a time, are even capable of realizing that they live in the past. This is why most people cross lifetimes much as they begin them.
I am sympathetic to the notion of “living in the present”, but I don’t think most of the people who mouth this goal are capable of truly grasping what is meant by it. I think what they live with is the idea of living in the present, and sufficiently skilled acting that they can convince themselves and others they have succeeded.
It is easy to pretend to be a guru. It is another to incur the countless scars and pain that in my view accompany useful wisdom. Anyone that has not had the shit beat out of them repeatedly, I have a hard time trusting.