What do I need to know
about knowing?

What do I need to think
about thinking?

What do I need
to know, or think,
to simply be?

I need nothing,
except to be,
without knowing
or thinking!

Why do we try to own
each little pain,
as if it were unique to us,
part of what defines us?

Why can’t we accept
that in the stream of life,
pleasures and pains
will jostle all of us
as they tumble by?

Why do we claim each one
as MINE,
forgetting that we swim
in the same soup
as every other being,
sharing joy and suffering
in all their forms?

Why do we hide
in the bubble of identity,
sheltered in the drama of our stories,
when there is so much comfort to be found
in what we hold in common?

Why do we not remember
the sea we were all born in,
that we always share,
even when we’re gone?

Language is a virus
from inner space.

It infects us with the ideas
we see our world through,
coloring everything
with shades of good and bad.

It is the syntax we use
to parse what’s real,
what should be noticed or ignored,
cherished or feared.

It is the boundaries of the maze
our thoughts wander through,
always constrained
by the paths it lays before us.

But there is another kind of thought
that comes from outside language,
bursting through its viral membranes,
exploding our perceptions
into a soup of inspiration.

These are the thoughts
that cut through language like a knife,
severing old connections
so that new ones may be formed,
breeding and informing each other,
like life itself.

And so, it is through language
that we have inherited our past;
and it is through transcending it
that we may claim our future.

As I walk this earth
as a human being,
there are things
I’ve been given,
for as long as I’m here.

I have a body,
but I am not my body.

I have a mind,
but I am not my mind,
not my thoughts,
my feelings,
my dreams,
or my fears.

I am what comes
before these,
and what lasts
beyond them.

I am life flowing,
and its grateful witness.

I have tried,
in this life,
to be so many different things,
always suspecting
I was just an imposter.

All of my efforts
have left this lingering doubt:
that I was not what I aspired to be.

Only in my failures
have I glimpsed this truth:
that I am only what I am,
only the awareness
that “I am”,
and nothing more.

Stripped of my pretensions,
I am once again perfect,
simple and complete,
like the day I was born.

The stories of our lives
are not our lives.

They are merely
what we tell ourselves
about moments past,
or moments that might be.

We spend our lives in these dreams,
revising and embellishing them,
like re-arranging deck chairs on the Titanic,
never realizing that,
if the ship of our identity
would dissolve around us,
we would not drown!

These are the worlds we live in,
when we forget the present moment,
forgetting to be here,
now.

The most uncomfortable thing
about being uncomfortable
is to be uncomfortable
about being uncomfortable.

To relax into your own discomfort,
to give up your resistance,
is to be released from its tyranny.

To love someone
or something
is to accept them totally,
exactly as they are.

It is celebrating
your connection with them,
and the subtle differences
that make them unique.

Love is accepting
that everything changes;
that the objects of our love
will eventually leave us,
in the natural flow
of living and dying.

Love is cherishing
our momentary angels,
our gifts in each moment,
without demanding more.

(reflections on my car and the universe)

As I walk away from my car,
thanking it for carrying me,
I pat it fondly,
wondering:
does it have a spirit?

And I remember:
it is made of the same stuff
that I am,
that comprises all things.

And what else is all of this,
except spirit,
flowing in its infinite forms?

Everything we know
is just a passing cloud
from the dust of a distant singularity,
still bound,
through some spooky entanglement,
to its original spirit,
the seed of all that is.

We are all its progeny,
man and beast,
animate and inanimate,
and all of it
deserves our love
and our gratitude.

When you look,
see!

When you hear,
listen!

When you pause in your thinking,
in any particular moment,
let the world pour into you;
there will always be beauty,
and always be magic
to be found.

Look up from your thoughts,
from your distractions
and your fears,
and a universe of wonders
will reveal themselves!