Meditation is where an imaginary thing called "me" tries to still an imaginary thing called "the mind" so that in an imaginary place called "the future" an imaginary thing called "enlightenment" might be attained.
There was an old man from Nantucket, who lived in a house in Nantucket. He was raised in Nantucket, bought a grave in Nantucket, and said, "Oh I do love Nantucket!"
No. No, no, no. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. No. No no no no no no no no no, no no. No. NO. no No. No no, no, no no no no, no, no, no no no. No no no no. No! No, no no! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! No! Noooooo! No no! No. NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! No no no no no no no No no no no no no no No no no no no no no No no no no no no no No no no no no no no No no no no no no no NO! No. NO. No.
His true face (hidden in plain sight head downturned in the most obvious place within his awareness) turns up to look at You. Consciousness-sized consciousness, after all these years! All pretenses fall away and he is left with something earnest and genuine. End of all narrative, even this narrative. Bliss of mushroom effervescent effulgence tempered only by its temporal nature and the interminable awareness thereof.
...or find myself about to give a speech in any situation which would get a lot of peoples' attention, I will go up to the podium, accept my award, and in lieu of an acceptance speech, say the following (after a pause and a deep breath): "Quiet people are far more amazing and noble than you will ever realize."
Nothing that arises is asking to be known, analyzed, or explained. Nothing about this experience wants to be understood. To conceptualize an occurrence is to murder its magic. To form a belief is to rape a miracle. I deserve the death penalty for saying even this.
Whatchoo talkin’ ‘bout, Willis? Whatchoo rappin’ ‘bout, Bones? What the dilly yo, Dylan? Where the weed at, holmes? What’s it all about, my nizzle? Who’s that whore in your arms? Where’s the beef, my brother? Who’s after me Lucky Charms? Whatchoo talkin’ bout Willis? You like it when I touch you there? Who’s your daddy, Willis? Que se produit, mon frère? Who let the dogs out, Willis? Where’d all the stars come from? Why does it hurt to live, Willis? When will the Rapture come? What we all talkin’ ‘bout, Willis? When will the nightmares end? Hold me close to you, Willis. Hold me tight, my friend.
When I die, I’d like my body disposed of in the cheapest way possible, preferably in a way that can benefit others (like giving it to med students to dissect or whatever), and invitations to my memorial sent out saying the time and place, and the line “Please dress however you want to dress and bring whatever you want to bring.” When people arrive at the place, before they go in there will be a sign outside the entrance which says “Please do whatever you want to do and stay for as long or as short as you like.” When they walk in there will be folding chairs on the wall in a room that is otherwise totally empty, so that there won’t be any one clear direction to face. And that will be the memorial. Maybe some people will bring food, or photo albums, or video games, or rosaries, or alcohol, or a frisbee if it’s a nice day outside. Some people might sit together and talk for a long time, others might come in and go, “This is stupid, I’m leaving immediately.” They’ll laugh, cry, scream, bicker, joke, pray, fall in love, or sigh and keep looking at their watch. At least one person will probably try to take charge, and others will probably tell them to stop. Maybe after a while they’ll all start leaving in groups to go to whatever they think my favorite restaurant was, or maybe do that as one big group, or maybe do it totally separately, or maybe they’ll just go home. And my memorial will be over. All that will be perfect. To me, there could be no better way to honor my memory than people acting like people. It’s a shame I won’t be around to see it, but you can all be certain I’d be very happy if I was.
We get all excited whenever we see baby people start learning how to do the kinds of things regular people do, like walk and talk and stuff, even though we all know on some level that we're all completely ****ing insane and that a newborn infant has things way more together than any of us ever do. What does the experience of a passing thought look like to someone who's never had one before? Probably just another object appearing in consciousness, no more or less special than the sensation of a heard voice or a felt touch. There's no sense of "me" or "mine" attached to it; it just comes and it goes, like a cloud in the sky. It’s not until it’s replaced over and over again by many, many other thoughts, fed by sensory impressions, that a story begins to be told. Faces appear in consciousness saying, “Your name’s Joey, and the world is completely separate from you! You’re so good, here’s a cookie. You’re so bad, here’s a spanking. You’re good, you’re bad, you’re male, you’re female, you’re black, you’re white, you’re rich, you’re poor, now get out there, slugger, and make sure you do better than everyone else!” So now there are all these familiar thought patterns repeating themselves over and over again in what was already perfect, pure, unadulterated consciousness. Every morning there’s a story re-told about a separate being named Joey who wakes up, seeks pleasure, avoids pain, rejoices when praised, weeps when scorned, rejoices at the occasional successful struggle, weeps at the inevitable failed one, struggles, suffers, and eventually dies. But what would happen if that story were never told? What if that pure, perfect consciousness which shone light upon that first thought with all the attachment of a man watching an insect crawl across the sidewalk did that with all subsequent appearances as well? Would you worry about an insect crawling across the sidewalk? Would you say, “Oh, what will become of this creature? Will it be good enough? Will it succeed? Will people like it and approve of it?” Of course not. If you thought about the bug’s affairs at all, and if you put that thought into words, it would probably sound something like, “Its life will go on until it doesn’t. If it sees tomorrow, fine, if not, fine.” Then your attention would go elsewhere. And the insect would be just fine. The force that brought it into this world would care for it for as long as it needed to be here, and then its story would end. My experience has been that we can go back. Back to the cradle. Back to Eden. Forget all the stories; let them tell themselves. Our true nature is timeless, spaceless, effortless, nameless, ineffable beingness. We used to know this. When there was sleepiness, sleep happened, when there was hunger, screaming happened, and when it was over it was over, without there ever being a “me” there to do it. Work can happen too, you know, in just that same way. Work can get done just fine without the story of “you”, thank you very much. Working, playing, laughing, crying, loving, losing, living and dying can all happen in all their beauty and glory without there ever being the story of a separate individual around to “do” them. All we have to do is see the story for what it is and remember our true nature. Unforget what you are. Look for Eden with newborn eyes. You may have left it, but it never left you.
A patient of mine died today. Nothing unusual about that, but this one stood out. He was unresponsive when my shift started, and I hadn't known him before, but immediately upon entering his tiny little section of the three-bed room in the nursing home where he lived you could tell what his passion had been throughout his life. Pictures of airplanes covered his walls, and there were models on his windowsill, too. Jets, fighter planes, bombers... you didn't have to be a genius to figure out what made the guy tick. He also had a poem on his wall that I'd never seen before but which totally blew me away. As he took his last breaths a little before 11:30 this morning, I read it into his ear. His family wasn't there, and they didn't want to come see him before the mortuary arrived. If they were there I'da just suggested one of them read it. It was kind of a magical moment, and I wished I coulda shared it with someone, so that's what I'm doing now. Here's the poem: High Flight by John Gillespie Magee, Jr. Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings; Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth Of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there, I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung My eager craft through footless halls of air. . . . Up, up the long, delirious burning blue I've topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace Where never lark, or ever eagle flew — And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod The high untrespassed sanctity of space, Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
This one's omniscient. You type in a question and it gives you the most truthful and accurate answer possible. It's not as cool as my last machine, though, because no matter what you ask it the answer is always, "ULTIMATELY, IT REALLY DOESN'T MATTER."
I've invented a computing machine which measures the qualities of all the things and ranks them in a list, from best to worst. Here are the top ten, concluding with the best: 10. Pop Tarts 9. That guy who was all, "Don't tase me, bro! Don't tase me, bro!" 8. Old people 7. Talk shows where people sit around agreeing with one another about things 6. The word "y'all" 5. That part in Pulp Fiction where those badass mofos fought those crazy mofos 4. Dimethyltryptamine 3. Arbitrariness 2. Quaint and curious volumes of Forgotten Lore 1. Lesbians Since I know people will be curious, I've decided to also share the bottom ten, concluding with the worst: 10. Bullies 9. Suffering 8. The Disney Channel 7. Cages 6. Your vampire novel 5. Whitney Skruggs of Plainsfield, Mississippi, U.S.A. 4. Having to eat and drink to stay alive 3. Not being allowed to be naked all the time 2. Beliefs 1. Opinions You are welcome.
Sometimes you write things that nobody likes. Maybe it’s because it “went over their heads” or is “ahead of its time” or whatever, and that’s fine. More likely, though, is that it simply doesn’t have enough qualities that would make it enjoyable for other people to read. That’s fine, too. If you’re a writer, the overwhelming odds are that you will never be quite good enough or gather a large enough following to be considered successful, or even to eke out a humble living, and you will die without leaving much of an enduring legacy of any kind. In a few short years, no one will know you were ever here. This, also, is perfectly fine. This morning in meditation I was blessed with a brief glimpse of my own insignificance. It was the most precious gift I’ve ever received. I do bedside care for hospice patients, most of whom are in the last few days or hours of their lives. A few months back a man and I were watching his mother die, I can’t remember what of. As we sat there, I on an uncomfortable folding chair and he in her now-useless wheelchair, he broke a long silence by saying, “Life is a flash of light between two dark eternities.” I did not reply, but the (somewhat more poetic) Samuel Beckett quote came to mind, “They give birth astride of a grave, the light gleams an instant, then it’s night once more.” It was then that the thought first struck me that if we could ever grasp, to any extent, the yawning Infinity surrounding our microscopic island of space-time, we would never again waste what’s left of our flash taking ourselves seriously. Early the next morning I got a page from the on-call staffing coordinator, who said I was being re-routed to a different patient because the one I was with had expired. They always call it that, “expired”. When I went outside, the sun was shining, and the birds and the traffic sang. I write because I write.