It lingers, hope. It lingers as much as despair does. The story of hope for a better life and a better world, that the world's story will improve along the lines of less (or no) fear-driven actions and more (or totally) compassion-based actions lingers, even with those who supposedly have no stake in the world's story. The mind needs the story; the personality needs a goal. Very few see this world as utopia. If they do, they are dismissed as deluded or blinkered, or as coming from a place of apathy and privilege. For all of mankind's history - the story of humanity - there has been strife and peace, suffering and redemption. Life, the story of it, is always in balance.
There is no time for the story to unfold, not really. It is always now o'clock. The memories and speculations that make up the story are happening now. There is nowhere to go but here. When that hope - though persistent - and that despair - though recurring - and the thoughts of yesterday and tomorrow - though abiding - are no longer taken for the point of it all, what is left is a boundless now, a spaceless here, full and empty, everything and nothing. You are not separate from what you are seeing, hearing, feeling, touching, even thinking. There is no difference; that is you. You are everything. Perhaps even more importantly, you are everyone. Every person you seem to meet shares the same consciousness. If the self and its concerns are lost, the whole world is gained, by no one. Just like that Jesus dude said.
14 comments:
Hope is in belief. It's there if you want it. Just letting this be as it is evaporates any need to hope.
Even in letting this be as it is, little hopes spring up: hope that daughter doesn't fall off her bike, but if she does, offer comfort and bandages; hope for sun for the picnic, but if rain unfolds, let the contingency exceed the original plan. Little hopes in the play of life, spicing the appearance, making it delightful, for no one. There is no right way to be, or wrong way to think. Hopefulness can linger, but perhaps it needn't be hopefulness in the face of existential need.
I have seemingly corrected your comment with the correct spelling, and it seemed you were with us at the concert the whole time!
Good point. Nothing wrong with little hopes springing up as this.
Hi Rian, thanks for correcting my very very very early comment on your blog. And I WAS there, especially when Leonard was singing "Suzanne"! (That song is definitely all about my character.)
Hey No Plane, if hope springs, despair must fall!
Sounds sticky to me, but I'll take it! ;-D
BTW, beautiful essay!
Essays! THAT's what they are. Sounds way more important than "blog entry".
For some reason that word stuck. In the bleary morning I couldn't find another.
Beautiful blog-entry-essay Suzanne!
:-D :-D :-D
Hey No Plane, I think "essay" is incredibly accurate. Little essays. Excellent.
Beautiful.
Now o'clock. I love that pointer.
Hi Cap'n Dave, I like it too. No denying it. And Svante, thank you so much.
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