240211 - Dispassion and Doubt

Dispassion. The quenching of the fire. This is what Lord Buddha teaches. The worldly man looks at him with distaste, so the poet, although with more curious eyes, rejects him with the passion he is denied. Life is passion. Passion is Dukkha, our noble man interjects. We are at a crossroads. The unlucky of us are caught by the gunsquad, and must make a choice.

“Better not to have started. If started, better to finish.”

Passion is life. Cooling it, we are caught in the stream of something else. The destiny of man is tainted with the irony of his upbringing. His final quest leads him back to the womb of his mother; only this time with the freedom to have walked each step himself. Is he wiser? Perhaps. Better off? Perhaps not. As we leave this earth, what have we gained? Nothing at all. And yet. To leave an imprint in the heart of another with a warm smile; to share a look, a nod, with a stranger. A day of conversation, a warm meal. To have shared, to have taken part in the grand communion. What else? How can we preach dispassion without rejecting life?

Day 6 of a silent meditation retreat. I’m halfway through walking meditation, looking down at my bare feet on the cool concrete floor. The tears start dropping. I cry with absence. Where is the love? The fellowship of man? The laughter, the joy? I haven’t seen another human face for a week. I haven’t seen my own. I haven’t known what it’s like to be human.

Day 7. The morning is pregnant with a solemn bitterness. Why am I alive? Why am I here. What’s the point? I am angry at life itself. How dare She be? A few hours later, a couple dozen muscles stretched. The sun is rising in the tree-tops. “Negative mind”, I note with a smile. Observant, but not judgemental. I see it’s absurdity. Not because it’s wrong. It’s simply negative. It makes me feel worse. I vow to let my unavoidable pain be enough. I smile. The day continues.

Day 8. I recognize a new characteristic in the soil of my mind-stream. It’s clear, simple, pristine. It’s the kind of love devoid of passion. The one that doesn’t result in laughter but in a gentle smile. It’s not extravagant.

On the 10th day we gain in roundabout ways a chance to ask questions. A fellow voices my musings.

“I’ve been missing the laughter these last 10 days. Is this by design?”

Yes, he is answered. Dispassion does not hold place for laughter. I cringe. He does too, I see, in his absent response. “Interesting..” he mumbles.

Where does this leave us? I undoubtedly recognize the immensity of my inconspicuous personal changes. I recognize that they would not have arisen without the necessary conditions, and that they will cease once the conditions do so. These conditions were partly based in the dispassion of my environment, were symmetrical with the reason for my tears a few days earlier. Without an external source of joy, of love, there was space for a well to be discovered internally. And yet. Now day 11 has arrived. Where does this love lead me? What purpose does it serve? Is it not life itself we walk this earth to serve? To ease the suffering of thy neighbor, even when he might be known by the name of self?

To quench the passions is to return to the soil from which we were made. It is nothing less than Death.

“To die before we die.”

It is undoubtedly the ending of every path, for each and every one of us. Yet walking it willingly, prematurely, some might say. What is it to us? The notions of a fool?

“You’re wasting your life”, a stranger boldly tells my girlfriend as she’s waiting for a train to her Yoga course in India.

For all my philosophical musings, they amount to nothing more than a sigh into the void. I don’t know. All I know is this is all I can do. Nothing else makes sense anymore. Sometimes doubts plague me. Maybe the stranger is right. Maybe an 18-inch rope might offer the same recluse. “Doubting mind” I note with a gentle smile.