Thursday, June 18, 2015

The issues as they are presented to you can seem so substantial.  They can come as pressing social engagements, shoulds and shouldn'ts, claims, responsibilities, restaurants, events one should go to in hopes of meeting someone, rings to kiss, things to do because everybody's doing them...  And then there is the peace of Buddha and meditation, the calm presence in the present moment, one that leads to question some of the solidity of the world as it might appear to us, pressing upon us.

We have the guru,  the inner one, the outer ones we know from reading about, to guide us.  And there, after tending four pretty busy shifts, there is, again, the ikon, of Jesus washing the feet of his disciples.  And, one wonders, is this picture the culmination of the focus of the Christian story.  After all the wisdom, the miracles, the story of old prophecies fulfilled is the man himself, as if 'at last.'  Here he is in this ripe moment, good coming out of good, still, in this time of possibilities, before the realization of the bread that will be broken and the wine which is his blood.  The simple culmination of a wise life, not for any particular reason, not for any particular scriptural point to fulfill by letter, but simply to be who he is, to be, as the Buddhist might say, even that, simply, 'which is.'

Turn the world around and see it as it is.  Be 'that which is.'  Avoid the psychosomatic illnesses that come from believing too much in the solidity of appearances.  Be the man joyfully waiting on people.  Because it's your thing.  What took you so long.  There is nothing wrong with you the way you are.

That is the lesson.  You are perfectly fine the way you are, and the one waiting on people is doing very well in fact.


Of course he liked his disciples, his friends, his co-workers.  He liked hanging out with them.  Their core truth was the same of his own.  He enjoyed their banter.

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