Silent Musings

Sometimes I get the feeling that people take what I say a bit too seriously. Everything I write comes in the moment, and once it is gone, only your memories and the digital archives keep them alive. For me, life moves on to something new, and the past no longer exists. For real. When there is nothing left to say, that is for Now. Tomorrow, who knows what will come, if anything at all.

Often the something new in my life doesn’t include writing. Don’t get me wrong; I love writing. Every once in a while, I even take a look at something I wrote months ago, and I am amazed at the Truth that I find in what I said. On occasion, those words even seem to bring healing to people. But as with everything else, I must be true to myself first; otherwise, the result is tainted with pretense so transparent that it initiates an immediate search for the “delete” key.

I feel so happy right now. Not at all in the excited sense of the word, but rather in the peaceful and accepting sense. I just finished a meditation a little while ago. Lately I’ve been feeling that I could actually meditate indefinitely, if not for physical limitations. And even then, I could probably bear any level of physical discomfort. Somewhere along the line, I passed a point where I stopped resisting or expecting anything from meditation. Or life for that matter. The two go hand in hand.

OK, so I stretched the truth a bit. I still resist life here and there like everyone else. But not nearly as much as I once did. With regard to meditation, I am in awe of the beauty of utter simplicity. A friend of mine once said that transformation is the shift from nothing is very satisfying to nothing is very satisfying. Brilliant, and oh, so True.

When people ask me about meditation, they often tell me they have tried it but can’t sit still for even 15 minutes. What can I tell them? Practice.

Here is another hint that might unlock the door for some. The reason that people can’t sit still in meditation (or any other part of life) is that they want to eliminate what they perceive as the negative. In the case of meditation, it can be mind chatter or whatever unpleasant thoughts or feelings arise. How many times have I heard the words, “If I could only quiet my mind …”?

But the problem with that perspective is this: reducing the negative in anything only changes the scale on which you operate. It never eliminates duality. For example, if you reduce mind chatter to the point where you only have a fleeting thought once every 2 minutes, you may still be just as annoyed by that thought as you were with constant mind chatter. There is no escape from thoughts, feelings, or any other forms of negativity. There is only surrender, acceptance.

As one of life’s most excruciating ironies, a funny thing happens with surrender. Gradually one opens up to the profound beauty in every movement, thought, feeling, or stirring. One becomes able to perceive even the slightest shift in energy, and the Silence of Pure Being arises amidst the storm of thinking, feeling, and otherwise being alive.

No words can capture what comes next … as the saying goes, “you had to Be there”.

Ultimate serenity is the coming-to-rest of all ways of ‘taking’ things, the repose of named things. No truth has been taught by a Buddha for anyone anywhere.” -Nagarjuna (Mulamadhyamakakarika 25:24)