When...

"When every breath
Becomes a prayer
When every step 
Becomes a meditation
When every word
Becomes a song of love
When every heartbeat
Pulses gratitude
Then..." he paused
"Then what?" they urged
He smiled and bowed

It’s Not Complicated

I have on occasion had folks tell me, in the nicest way possible, that my writing and speaking about the Tao Te Ching are sometimes – hmm, how do they put it – dense, obscure, inaccessible. 

Oh dear.

I want them to be wrong, but of course I must admit that they are right. How can words describe the indescribable? More words, different words, cannot explain what the thinking mind cannot label or categorize. The very first line of the Tao Te Ching says “The Tao that can be understood is not the eternal Tao.”

So how do we talk about this mystery, what a Christian monk writing in the 14th century described as “the cloud of unknowing”? Even the author of the Tao Te Ching expressed this dilemma in Chapter 70.

My words are very easy to understand
And very easy to practice
Still, no one in the world
Can understand or practice them

(That passage always makes me smile.)

So why try? Because when we glimpse the beauty of that dark mystery, when for a moment we pierce the veil of the infinite, when the miracle of a single breath astounds us, the strings of our soul are set to humming, and we seek to share this music in harmony with each other in a cosmic jam session.

Yes, I admit that the efforts to share oftentimes obscure as much as they reveal. That is perhaps the nature of the endeavor. We complicate with our words what is simple, so very simple. Here is a conversation I had with one of my teachers last year.

Me: Does it really have to be so complicated?
Him: No.
Me: Can we talk more about this?
Him: No need to. The answer is no.

Ha! 

Yet here I am, still talking about it! Imperfect as it is, there is delight in the trying, even though we recognize that our attempts to capture what will remain ever elusive and free, will fail.

As Adyashanti says, our goal is to “fail well.”

It's all good.

Tao Te Ching – Chapter 52

This chapter reflects the motion of Tao as the origin of all things, manifesting into form and then returning to the source. The image of the divine mother figures prominently, giving us the sense that Tao gives birth to, rather than creates, “all under heaven.” The bond between Tao and the universe is compared to the bond between mother and child.

All under heaven has a source
This source is the mother of all things
To know the mother is to know the child
To know the child is to abide in the love of the mother
Thus becoming one with the eternal source of all things
And therefore beyond all danger

I’ve taken a little liberty with the characters in my translation, but I think it reflects the essential message of this passage. We connect to the divine (by whatever name we use – God, nature, universal energy) through our connection to each other. Indeed, through our connection to all under heaven.

A Course in Miracles teaches that any separation we create between ourselves and whatever we identify as “other than self” effectively separates us from our holy source. In other words, we cannot be connected to God if we are separated from others in any way, for example, through anger, judgment, fear, exclusion. All of creation reflects the holy source, and is one with it, like a rainbow manifesting the color spectrum of undifferentiated light. When we separate ourselves into “us” and “them,” it’s like saying that blue is the color of light but red isn’t.

This next passage contrasts our tendency to jump in and direct things with the inherent perfection of nature’s flow, which takes care of itself when we surrender our own agendas.

Close the mouth
Shut the door
Life is untroubled
Open the mouth
Meddle in affairs
Life is lost

The Tao Te Ching has a clear preference for careful words and non-interference with the natural flow of universal energy. There is a natural, effortless, perpetual unfolding of the world. When we interfere, no matter how well intentioned, we disrupt that natural flow. Imbalance results, sometimes with disastrous consequences. Then we are caught up in an endless struggle to repair, to fix, to restore.

We see this on a global scale, and also in our individual lives. Think about a time when you tried to make something better, and only made it worse. Of course, there are times when our efforts do lead to desired results, as when we clean up environmental damage, or make amends to heal a relationship. But we can always go back to the moment when we first set ourselves on a path out of sync with nature’s inherent wisdom. We can’t go back, but life pretty much guarantees that we will have another opportunity to make a choice!

The final passage brings us back to the concept of returning to our natural state of balance moment by moment.

Seeing the small is called enlightenment
Abiding in tenderness is called strength
Using the light 
We restore our inner vision without exposure to misfortune
This is our eternal practice

This is the point, isn’t it? That every moment, every holy instant, offers us a choice – to be fully present or to be lost in distraction. We think that enlightenment is some goal to achieve in the future, and that once achieved we can sit back and bask in eternal serenity. But it isn’t like that. We practice, in every moment. Without judgment, because in the time it takes to judge ourselves, several more opportunities have passed. So we practice again.

Our practice becomes integrated into our daily lives. We don’t practice only when we are on our meditation cushion, or in church, or in martial arts class. We practice with every breath, every heartbeat. Our practice IS our life. So beautiful.

There is no such thing as enlightenment. There are only enlightened moments. ~Adyashanti

Foggy Morning

Geese flying on a foggy morning
I hear them honking and look up in time
To see them disappear into the mist
One by one

Where We Grow

Someone asked recently whether we would grow spiritually without struggle. Good question. The Tao Te Ching describes a life in harmony with Tao as effortless, without conflict or strife. In martial arts, we train with the slogan “Don’t insist. Don’t resist.” We know that trying to force something or someone might work sometimes but there will always be someone stronger. We learn other ways of dealing with force that do not involve struggle.

So what is the role of struggle in our spiritual lives? If my true nature is one with the universe, where is the need for struggle? Struggle occurs when we are somehow in conflict with the natural flow of energy. It indicates a place where we are blocking our true nature. Perhaps it is not the struggle that promotes growth as much as the relinquishment of struggle. In that sense, struggle is not how we grow; it’s where we grow.

I like the phrase “the razor’s edge of practice.” This is where I am poised on a challenge, something that has the potential to get me hooked, something that triggers an urge to grasp or reject or control. The razor’s edge is where I have a choice about which side I’m going to step into – the side of conflict or the side of harmony.

Where that edge is, is different for different people. And different for the same person at different times. We might find ourselves on the razor’s edge infrequently, or every day! No matter. It is always an opportunity to make a choice to struggle or to release.

Lately, it has been on the daily end of the spectrum for me. I’d like to tell you that I always choose to release, especially with so many opportunities for practice (!), but that would be fibbing. When I step into struggle, however, I feel it throughout my body. I tense up, my breathing moves up into my chest, and I am caught in my thinking mind, like the hamster wheel I described in the last post.

No need to judge myself. Just belly breathe. Release the struggle and allow the natural flow of energy. Tolerate the discomfort and uncertainty with trust. Pour compassion over the fear. In this moment...and this one...

Asking for Miracles

I’ve been churned up lately about a personal situation. I find myself on the hamster wheel, running and running and getting nowhere. I run over things past – words that were said, decisions that were made, actions that were taken. I imagine different words, different decisions, different actions, and the different outcomes that would have resulted.

But those outcomes are just fantasies, because no one knows what would have happened. And even if those outcomes would have come to pass, the fact is that they didn’t, because those paths were not chosen. And all my running is just spinning stories. As A Course in Miracles teaches, “The only wholly true thought one can hold about the past is that it is not here.”

The wheel turns and I am still running, now into the future. I am imagining conversations I will have, choices I will make, outcomes I will direct to make things better. I feel anticipation and anxiety. What if, what if, what if. I am still spinning stories, now stories about the future, stories that are no more true than the stories about the past. Stories about outcomes that I desire but cannot ensure.

And why do I desire them? Because I have judged them good. But what makes me think I know what would be good? Many things I thought were bad at the time turned out to be good, and the reverse is also true. Good and bad are just more stories.

I begin to see that the outcomes I am trying to bring about, through trying to control what I cannot control, might not bring the relief I seek from the pain I feel about the past and the anxiety I feel about the future. So I run faster, trying to figure this all out. Until I start to tire. Until I start to realize that the pain and anxiety are not about what is real in this moment. They are about the running, the endless spinning on the wheel that goes nowhere. I am exhausted.

Finally, I ask for a miracle, not about changing the past or ensuring the future. I ask to stop the wheel and get off.

And the miracle about miracles is that once you ask for one, you will surely get it. Not because of some hocus pocus or law of attraction. You will get a miracle because it is our natural birthright, our true nature. We discover that all miracles are the same miracle – being fully alive in this holy instant, one with the vastness of all creation. Grateful.

I wake today with miracles correcting my perception of all things. ~A Course in Miracles

Remembering

The spring of remembering
Burbles up through mossy ground
Trickling over creek rocks
Meandering past summer fields
Thundering through gorges
Sinking finally, gratefully into the sea
Ah yes! I remember now
It was me all along