Liz is having an metaphysical crisis, as she has been prone to since she was 9 years old. p. 151. We both seem to want the universe to stop for a second, so we can understand what's going on. However, we seem to differ in that she seems to want to control everything (Apparently, she has accepted that Richard from Texas is right), control her experience, control her destiny. I just want to know what the hell is going on so I know where I fit in, so I can belong somewhere, lest this eternal racing of time passes me buy, leaving me feeling lost and alone crying on the roadside of space and time.
I've always wanted to belong somewhere, to fit in somewhere. My first metaphysical moment wasn't a crisis. It came on the bike ride I wrote about previously. I was on a night time bike ride with my dad and I asked, "Dad? What's really up there? I mean what's really up there?" I don't know if he was more taken aback by the question or the fact that it was asked by a 6th grader.
I want to understand God's universe so I can feel a part of it. I want the play book. If I can't get that (odds are I never will) then I'll settle for the play book on acceptance. Or, the play book on a quiet mind would be nice, too.
I seem to recall having a quiet mind once. I related to her parable about the Irish farmer with an inherent quiet mind gazing peacefully into the fire place. p. 154.
"'Da,' [Sean says] 'this meditation stuff, it's crucial for teaching serenity. It can really save your life. It teaches you how to quiet your mind.'
"His father turned to him and said kindly, 'I have a quiet mind already, son,' then resumed his gaze on the fire.
"But I don't. Nor does Sean." Neither do I.
I used to be able to gaze peacefully into the fire. My family used to have a cabin, built by my dad's parents and uncles. It was a humbled structure that started out as a small caravan. The cabin I came to love sat on a hill, up a winding dirt road from a lake in southern Minnesota. It had a front porch and back porch added on to it. The middle room (with a kitchenette and that magical fireplace I would gaze into) was all what was left of the 1940's caravan. My grandparents handed it down to my dad. He handed it down to me.
I used to be able to go on quiet walks in the woods near the cabin. In my troubled, misfit teen years, I could find solace there. Even though I was lonely. I was peacefully lonely. I could gaze out the screen windows on the front porch, down the hill, towards the lake; or into the dancing flames of a late-night fire, mesmerized and fall asleep peacefully.
Maybe those peaceful moments started to end when my alcoholism was awakened by the few random parties in high school or by the strip clubs when I was 18. Maybe, that's when the chase started. At the beginning, it wasn't as intense as later in life. I grew into my disease slowly. Certainly, however, my inner peace began to waver. My comfort and solace with nature wavered. My ability to find peace in the wind blowing through the trees or in the hissing and crackling of a small fire faltered. And, as I chases and feared and chased some more, the cabin faded and decayed as did my inner peace and my connection with God, until both were eventually torn down.
While what used to be the cabin is an empty plot of land, I'm rebuilding the other. It seems ironic that I'm rebuilding my connection with God by learning to let go. Like Liz, letting go is scary for me. I don't know what it is. I don't know what it means. That place of "active passivity" (as an acting teacher of mine once called it) is evasive.
Afraid of what seeking God's enlightenment "like a man with his head on fire looks for water" (p. 156) will bring, will turn me into, I wonder if I'm even chosen for enlightenment at all. Maybe, because of a hard-wired character flaw, I will never have the placid mind to receive such a gift. That isn't so painful a thought. It would mean I wouldn't have to chase anymore and accept what is. It seems like a cop-out. How long would I be satisfied with that? How long would it be until I'd start chasing again, simply because I inexplicable had to?
Richard from Texas says, "you gotta let go and sit still and allow contentment come to you." p. 155
I see now that I've got it all wrong.
No comments:
Post a Comment