Oct 16

what cannot be taken

the taste of the eternal defies description — more intimate than a first kiss, more exhilarating than freefall, more satisfying than the richest meal or the most coveted reward. and the best part is: it is always available to you. it does not sit on a shelf, it does not fade, it does not disappear. you do not possess it — you dissolve into it. it is always here, waiting for the one who lets go, who stops expecting, stops grasping, stops clinging. what you lose, you gain. what you gain, you lose. and yet — look at this ball i found in my pocket: 🎱

someday you are going to die. everything you have ever owned — your money, your clothes, your food, your furniture, your drugs, your guns, your phones, your computers, your body, your mind, your family, your friends, your dearly beloveds, your planets, your galaxies, your universes — will all be taken, whether you cling to them or not. it doesn’t matter what race, brotherhood, church, community, occupation or nationality you belong to. these too will scatter like sand in the wind. nothing was guaranteed, nothing will be delivered. and yet, even knowing this, you will lose more still, beyond the material. every desire, every fear, every story you tell yourself about who you are, every image you cling to — these are layers of bondage keeping you tethered to the same old routine. one day, all of it will be stripped until only the root remains: the absolute, the one with all, the all with one. and you will strip it away.

meditation is the work. the work is to become as naked as possible — to meet the world and yourself unburdened by the weight of what is not eternal. meditation is the practice: discipline, devotion, conscious letting go. each thought observed without grasping, each emotion felt and released, each story allowed to dissolve — this is revolution. this is liberation. this is love, this is joy! it is the most essential work you will ever do, for all else follows from this.

a child cannot open to joy while kicking and screaming in attachment to what is fleeting. let it wither and die. let the heart unclench. let the mind settle. let the self that insists on being separate fall away. only then does the eternal bloom — uncontainable, inexhaustible, immediate.

the work is radical. it is urgent. it is yours. breathe into it, move with it, dissolve into it, and let yourself become one with all that has always been. sit with the silence, and listen — by god, listen — it is your teacher as much as mine, nudging us all toward it in so many ways. listen until what it is and you are one and the same. you will be reminded again in the meantime.

you have 24 hours in a day. please spend at least one with your infinite loving presence. if not one hour, ten minutes. if not ten, one. every second is worth the effort. don't take my word for it — see for yourself what cannot be taken.