The Truth Ain't Sexy!

"Truth is as poor as Job, as barren as the desert sand, and as boring as an old second-hand bookseller.

-- Hjalmar Soderberg

No wonder the truth has so few friends! It's redeeming qualities are hidden, and it's got no voluptuousness or virileness to attract people to it. The truth stands alone.

As well it should. The truth has not entered a popularity contest. The very fact that most people coldly ignore it, is, to paraphrase the Tao Te Ching, a sort of proof that it is indeed the truth!

Seekers of the truth, and to an even larger degree, speakers of the truth, are reviled, laughed at, and even pitied in most cultures. Dreamers philosophers and mystics, are assumed to be effete and less involved in life than your average Joe Six Pack. Nothing could be further from the truth.

To engage life at its deepest levels, the levels where ultimate truth resides, requires a certain spiritual musculature that makes Arnold Schwarzenegger look downright wimpy. The truth both requires and elicits strength, even more so because it has no natural sex appeal. Seeing truth is like seeing the incredible beauty in the homely girl at the high school dance rather than merely being dazzled by some Barbiesque bimbo and her silicone sisters.

So, don't expect truth to find truth standing provocatively on the street corner whispering, "Hey philosopher, want a date?" The corner is home to all flash and no substance.

Truth will never seduce you; you must seek it out with both insight and perspicacity. And in your search you'll fall asleep reading, fall in love with illusion, and fall for demigods and drag queens. Just keep on keeping on. Somewhere, hidden in the poverty, bareness, and boredom, truth will indeed be found.

Spontaneous Action

"Having overcome the obstacles to the comprehension of life as it really is, we manifest spontaneous, unmotivated action completely appropriate to the present moment."

-- Claude Whitmyer

Wu wei. That's what the classical Taoists call it. Spontaneous, non-volitional action, action that doesn't originate from the ego. And, no, I'm not talking about mindless, knee jerk re-action. As Claude reminds us, the action we are referring to here is always appropriate for the time, place and situation.

The key to performing such action, to allowing such action to be manifest through you, is direct and unmediated comprehension of reality. No beliefs, no shoulds, no theories, no emotional coloring -- just pure perception, total acceptance and deep understanding.

Did I say "just?" It's a tall order to see the world as it is without the distortions of socialization, beliefs, feelings, and cognitions. Most of the time we don't even realize that the world we think we "see" is not really the world as it is. Our conditioning is so deep and unconscious that we have a hard time seeing the world except through the filters that have become our second nature.

But when "the doors of perception are cleansed," as Blake said, and Huxley echoed, everything stands clear and undisguised. In that clearing, action happens, without us having to decide what action to take. True spontaneity rules and we act in harmony with what is, whatever what is may be.

That's our goal. Not to have to ruminate and speculate and struggle. To move easily, effortlessly and enjoyable through life. At one with it all, and yet each unique in our own way.

Wu wei. Doing nothing. And yet nothing remaining undone.

The Power of Forgiveness

"By forgiving someone else, and forgiving yourself, you take back your power."

-- Leonard Willoughby. Every Day Tao, p.100.

I've done some stupid things in my time. Some unconscious, uncaring, dumb ass things. Some of them I can look back on and laugh. Most I can look squarely in the eye and work through and let go. And each and every time I do, I notice how right Leonard is -- my power returns. Sometimes it's almost a visceral jolt of energy re-entering my system. Other times it's a more mild reabsorption of power, power that I didn't even know I had given away.

And the same is true with forgiving other people. When I can find it in my heart to let go of my hurt, my anger, or my confusion and simply forgive, my power returns. No longer am I projecting negative energy out towards a person who I feel wronged me. Instead, I re-own the energy by realizing that we all do some really stupid shit in our lives, and we all need forgiving.

It's like most important things in life -- it's simple, but not easy. Anytime you catch yourself condemning -- either yourself or others -- you begin to work with it. You peel pack the onion-like layers of anger, hurt, mistrust and condemnation until you get to the heart of acceptance. Acceptance is, in and of itself, a re-owning of power because you are no longer at war with reality, you are harmonizing with what is. It takes alot less energy to flow with than to fight against. Power saved is power gained.

And so, forgiveness isn't just some nice, little moral rule of thumb -- it's a practical, useful universal operating principle. Forgiveness grows personal power. The kind of power that you can use to be more loving, to be more authentic, to play and grow and share and discover, and, most of all, to really, truly enjoy your life.

Happiness Comes of Its Own Accord

"Just as you don't have to do anything to help make spring come, the winged happiness that the poets speak of will come on its own. It's coming . Earth will swing on its ellipse whatever you do, and crocuses will come up. The poets say happiness comes like this, though we cannot see the works. It is coming. This is an extremely encouraging insight, and I hope I will be able to remember it."

-- Jennifer Michael Hecht. The Myth of Happiness, p. 319

Spring is coming. Happiness is coming. Or, to paraphrase the Taoist sage Lao Tzu, the world operates perfectly without your interference or help.

So why then do we always feel like we have to do something?

It's the malaise of the modern Western mind. Do, do, do. Make it happen. Take the bull by the horns.

Well, it's all bull! Happiness happens. Life happens. We may be part of that happening, but by no stretch of the imagination do we create it, do we make it happen.

The inner working of happiness are at the same time too complex and too simple for our minds to grasp, for our willpower to control. The complexity is in all the many energies, forces, and elements that impact happiness. The simplicity is in the underlying Unity of it All.

Since you can't summon happiness at your beck and call, does that mean you just sit around with your thumb up your ass sliding deeper and deeper into existential angst and ennui? Of course not! You do what you do. You keep on keeping on. You do what you have to do, and you do what you want to do, and happiness finds you.

Once it finds you, it may not stay forever. Hell, sometimes it doesn't even stay the night! But it will always return. You can count on it, just like spring. Round and round, natural cycles, the happiness merry go round. Happiness is happening now and now and now. What else to do but enjoy the ride?

Let It Come to You

"You can't go chasin' life all over tarnation. You got to set back and let it come to you. Stay in one place long enough and most everythang'll come by at least once."

-- Rancid Crabtree. From the story Sequences by Patrick McManus

Pursuit gets some high cred in our culture. Pursue your goals, pursue your dreams, chase what matters. But what about the second law of thermodynamics -- for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction? What if the truth is that what you pursue, flees you? Then what good is all this running around chasing your tail business? Rancid thinks it's no good, no good at all.

Imagine sitting back, relaxing, abiding in the present moment. Nowhere to go, nothing to pursue. Whatever the Universe offers, you gladly accept, but you chase after nothing, jones for nada. Whatever comes, you let it come. Whatever goes, you let it go. Detached awareness, equanimity.

That is the spiritual path of Rancid Crabtree, as well as that of many great spiritual traditions, including Taoism and Buddhism. All this hyper- activity that we think leads to accomplishment, and ultimately, hopefully happiness, is seen as mere busyness. Can you be happy right here, right now? That is the only real question worth asking.

Because if you can't, you've taken the Ginzu Knife of desire and sliced the world completely in two. Not only have you created unhappy time (now) versus happy time (somewhere in the future), but also you have cleaved the world into two distinct and separate groups -- those who have what it takes to achieve happiness and those who don't. We are no longer One. We are competitors locked in a dualistic battle for the golden ring of happiness.

No thanks. I think I'll sit this one out. And as I sit here, I'll watch. I'll watch for whatever will "come by at least once." And I'll be happy. Damn right I'll be happy! And grateful. Grateful that I no longer believe in the myth of achieved happiness. Happy to be here at all.

Your Relationship to Reality

"Spirituality is our relationship with the reality that is before us at this moment."

-- Leonard Willoughby. Everyday Tao, p.161

Spirituality is not about beliefs. You can believe whatever you want, and neither the beliefs themselves nor the process of believing will add one wit to your spiritual standing.

Spirituality is all about reality. It is about your stance in, and interaction with, the reality of the now.

There are no secret doctrines to which you need to be privy, no esoteric practices that you must master in order to live the life of the Spirit. Spirit is all there is! You need only relate to reality as such.

If each and every Being is God, if each and every moment Divine, of what use are beliefs? Your joyous task, your play in the fields of the Lord, becomes merely perceiving the all in One, the One in all, and then acting spontaneously and accordingly.

What could be simpler? What could be more difficult?

Don't take my word for any of this -- try it. Experiment. Lay down your beliefs and be in the unadulterated now. See what happens.