To Those Of You I've Never Met

We don't know each other, but what is
there to know, really? We all got born,
do something in the middle, and grow old 

and die. Seems pretty rote, if you ask me.
And, yes, I know,  we all have the important
things in our  lives that drive us crazy or keep
us going….same thing really. And we all want

the same basic thing…happiness, for lack of a
decent word. We have happiness, whatever it
is, and try to keep it, or, we don't have it and
try to get it. The lucky ones are those who

never knew about happiness…who never
had a refrigerator or spent a week at Disneyland…
the ones who never wanted more…

I don't know if you are one of them….in fact,
there are so many of you I don't know, that
I'm sure every conceivable type of person is
among you….by type, I mean color, age,

temperament…the personal, superficial qualities.
What amazes me about most of you is that,
while you find plenty of things to do to keep
yourselves busy, very few of you take the time,
(in fact, it probably never occurs to you to do so)
to look at life itself and ask the only real question,
to my mind:"What is this?"  And, not only  to
ask the question, but to take steps to look into
what life is.

This is the most persistent question I have
about all of you.  After all, we have the capacity
to do more than just exist… our brains are
incredible tools that are capable of so much.

And so many great teachers of many traditions
have dispensed healing wisdom for the constantly
unsatisfactory situation we find ourselves in
much of our lives. 

Most of you have the same solution to this
dissatisfaction: get something that will
make it go away. I don't have to make
a list of possible "somethings", because
almost anything you  can think of would
be on it. This is what you do, and, if you're

old enough and have been paying attention,
you realize that it doesn't work….it never did.

I see you in the streets everywhere…
going along with the  latest agenda…sifting
through what you see around you for those
bits that fortify what you think is happening like
self-entertaining pinball machines.  You read
the latest reports to navigate your lives so
your version can remain unchallenged.

or, your milieu is so strong that it holds
you up in your place without much effort
on your part. 

I'm not trying to be critical…the phenomenon
I'm pointing to is too pervasive but to wonder
at. But every game has a clue,  and the clue to life,
where the treasure lies, is in the uncertainty

that we'd sure like to do without, but that
seems to be always  with us (got to have a ringer
here) like an itch we cannot scratch.

Make use of what's available. Couldn't one
say that that is one  phrase that defines part
of what it means to be human? Is that

what most of human accomplishment and
advancement pays homage to?  If we look at
what's available to us in terms of our experience,
we have rich resources at our disposal. We
have five senses that give us information. We
have the brains that are  capable of processing
that information. We also have unique gift:

self awareness…which includes awareness
of that which is not self….so, basic duality is
the "Go" square we start off on.

And we don't have to use self awareness
too much….just enough to work our sync
with not us so there isn't too much friction,
if possible. If you're a human just trying to
survive, of which there is a far greater number
in the world than 50%, one's awareness doesn't

have much time to get beyond that. If you're
a big fat slob drinking beer and watching
football, you don't care. Not much difference
there, really, except for the amount of suffering
versus temporary pleasure.

Make use of what's available. There are
10 to the 75th power bits of  matter in the
universe, it's been estimated. It's also been
estimated  that there are 10 to the 1,000,000
power possible relationships for the axions
in the human brain…..Doh!  The Mahayana
texts of Buddhism, such as the Diamond Sutra,
seem full of repetitive hyperbole about the

vastness of….well, pretty much everything.
For me personally, reading  them was like
mind isometrics that, instead of pushing muscles
inward  to strengthen them, pushed mind
outward to loosen it. This is one minor

example that tools have been developed…
since almost before tools were developed….
to understand the nature of mind.

So, folks, I hope I haven't been overly something,
but hey, it's free. And I may never get the chance
to meet you in person, but I wanted you

to know something.  I love all of you. I might not
like most of you if I met you…but love, yes, I can
do that, because, beneath it all in all of you,

like it or not, we're all looking for the light.