Yielding, I am welcomed to the doorway of surprise. There are at least two ways to read the above statement: nothing is ever lost. I have a clear preference. One that makes me giggle.
From what I’ve learned regarding the laws of matter, of physics, energy is never lost; it is endlessly transmuted into new forms: vapour becomes liquid becomes solid and then, possibly, makes the return trip home to vapour. Lovely.
Not unlike the archetypal “hero’s journey” as posited by Joseph Campbell, the human dream witnesses a brilliant play of light and colour: She begins empty and open. In timelessness, she becomes folded, contorted, or conditioned. She encounters opportunity in the way of challenge. She lets go of that which feels secure and solid in order to discover the unknown and unfamiliar. Through courage and foolishness or faith, she comes to know herself anew, open and empty. She returns home with a story for so-called ‘others.’
As a chaplain intern, I facilitated a Christmas Eve service yesterday. Remarkable in that it was my first ever experience hosting a religious-based congregational gathering. First also for me in the experience of a Christmas Eve service. Fortunately, a kind collective looked back at me standing at the podium, an advent wreath to my left. Most were in wheelchairs, some were napping. In the weeks leading up to December 24th, I feverishly apprised myself of the Jesus story, particularly his birth. Here was someone, an appearance of form, a human mind-body, who in his short life demonstrated an unparalleled embodiment of unadulterated and unapologetic knowing. And, for that he was crucified. Is that the good news?
“Light is sweet,
and it pleases the eyes to see the sun.
However many years anyone may live,
let them enjoy them all.
But let them remember the days of darkness,
for there will be many.
Everything to come is meaningless.”– King Solomon, Son of David
We humans, we take the drama seriously seriously. Even while we see energy as transmuting and shifting and ultimately returning to stardust, I/we get awfully snagged up on meaning. There’s seemingly no end to the things we’ll worry about, this martha-care-actor included. Shit! I can constipate myself about toast crumbs on the kitchen counter. Never mind the knots I tie myself in over finances and what to do with this existence. Thinking we’re something of matter, we dream a dream of weightedness and intensity.
But what if one knows they are nothing: no-thing, simply the eternal play of light in the infiniteness of being – always and only relating to oneself, and others, as light – how seriously could one really take this thing we collectively refer to as “life?” Forty days and forty nights in the desert conversing with Satan, knowing that this is all the brilliant expression of mind-potential unwinding itself, would that be serious? Nailed to a cross? Vivid yes, but for one who knows the essence of their being, would this be just cause for getting their knickers in a knot?
It’s a big invitation – to see that life is a play, a drama of the No-Thing that we is, ever lost in Itself. Shits and giggles? Most spiritualists think there’s a higher purpose. Me, I’m not so sure. Collectively, humans are devoted to drama. We cultivate it endlessly in and amongst ourselves. We pray to it through media and technology. We produce it eternally through creative inspiration. How ridiculous is it, really, to think that the highest and clearest intelligence, the Is-ness, impregnates the human mind with its zeal for the spectacle and the absurd?
The hero’s journey: to return to the place from which one starts with a good story to tell. In joy.
As always, some new meditations have been added, for my mom and anyone else who’s keen.