Sunday 8 March 2009

I Don't Understand It.

Oh, the futility. I have a memory of watching the pasta boil last night (apparently) and being struck by the rolling boiling immediacy of everything. How to describe this, I thought, it's impossible. It's like that "now" . Unfettered, uncontrolled, vibrant, and not apart. It makes no sense to say I was the white boiling water, the stove, the pan, the hood light, but I was. It makes less sense to say I get on a bus, and feel profoundly that the little lights of awareness that are these other seeming individuals, are exactly the same as "me". That the quality of aliveness, stripped of all that stuff we hang onto it, is exactly the same; what seems to be a vital character, full of opinions and hang-ups, when stripped back to that very essence that seems to make us ourselves, is paradoxically just the same quality. That strong sense of "me" is actually just the same for "everybody". And even these little revelations are just the story, trundling along, not at all meaningful. There is deep wonder in it all. There is comfort for my character that I cannot make a mistake, although seeming mistakes are made. There is no separate will, however much the importance of "taking responsibility" or "making choices" is emphasized. Whatever it is "I" seem to do - whether it is carefully considered or utterly spontaneous - is exactly what must be done. And so, my mind seems to be relaxing. More and more, there is just being, boiling away, and my mind seems to be commenting on it less. But if I was gripped by a fearful need to control it all, that too, however inappropriate it may seem, that too would be perfect. I don't understand it. It is not understandable. But it is be-able.

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