The move has happened!
Lots of pictures coming your way showing the departure from Murphys and the arrival in Sequim. Remember the conversation about this place being perfect to accommodate all the practice and personal possessions needed for life in a new location? Chock-a-block is the best description. Between building tools, grounds-keeping tools, kitchen, meditation hall, bedding, cleaning supplies, indoor furniture, outdoor furniture, and Keep It Simple, we’ve hit capacity.
I was looking this morning at a very human process this move has highlighted. What we tend to do, when in the grip of egocentric karmic conditioning self-hate, is to require/demand/insist that “things” be the way I want them to be… and then suffer when they’re not. People need to, for instance, be on time. Don’t forget or get distracted. Pay attention. Follow directions. Not have better ideas. Be sensitive to people, places, and things. Not get lost in ego voices in conditioned mind. (I have no idea where these examples came from! Perhaps at this juncture you could make a list of examples of ways you “need” things to be?)
It’s very important to keep a firm hold on everything because otherwise things will go wrong. What we’re not meant to catch on to is that “going wrong” means “doesn’t go the way I want.” It didn’t unfold the way I foresaw. Didn’t meet my expectations. Didn’t meet my standards. I assumed it would be one way and it wasn’t at all like that. There were so many hiccups and curve balls—just to mix a couple of metaphors.
Fortunately, that’s not as egocentric as it might appear at first blush. We are deeply conditioned to believe we know what’s right. In fact, we know what’s correct for everything, not just some things but everything, and all we’re attempting to do is make sure it goes the way it should.
It’s so difficult to see what’s actually going on because, identified with ego, “what I want” is rarely labeled “what I want.” It’s hidden, often couched as right or best or, at the very least, as good.
The very bitter pill for most of us to swallow is that none of that is true. We have no idea what’s right or best or even good. Not only that, Life is never going to go any way other than the way it goes. It doesn’t matter what I want, how hard I work, what I sacrifice, how much I twist myself up to be the “right” person. Life will go right on being Life, not because of me nor in spite of me. Worst of all Life isn’t even aware of me, “me” being an illusion and all.
It’s certainly fine for us to want whatever we want—though helpful to keep somewhere near the front of conscious awareness that wanting what “I” wants is the primary cause of suffering. Well, then, where does that leave a person who is simply attempting to be the best person s/he can be? Actually, it leaves us right where we always are, but if we’ve swallowed the pill, we’re a lot clearer about it.
Here’s another fill-in-the-blanks: I will posit that some attributes of the “best” person are humble, kind, grateful, generous, honest—a person of integrity. (Take a moment to make your list, please.)
I bet for most of us our list would not be compatible with “getting what I want” as our first priority. True? Which can offer some clarity into the bamboozle we’ve fallen for. When we realize what our motive is (being the best person we can be), and that focusing on outcomes (things need to go a certain way to be the way they should be) has nothing to do with our motive of being the best person we can be, we increase our odds of being the person we choose to be as we let Life unfold as Life unfolds.
What does all that have to do with the move? Events like moving tend to activate egocentric karmic conditioning/self-hate., gets those identified-with-the-illusion-of-a-separate-self juices stirred up. It’s clearly, obviously, a world of unknowns. Sure, we know every moment is a world of unknowns, but, no, we don’t. We might accept it as a theory, but we are not about to live that way. I need to be in charge. I need to have control of this or it will spin out into who knows what. And, throughout this move, none of us bought that load of codswallop.
We asked our beloved neighbor and friend Jose if he would move us. He said yes. We said thank you and folks started packing. We turned the whole thing over to him and the whole affair, from beginning to end, was flawless (through Mercury retrograde no less). Seamless perfection. And, did I mention worry-free? Nothing to think about, nothing to tense up about, no figuring out anything, no pre-solving of imaginary problems.
We’re very suspicious that this process could have broad application.
In gasshō,
ch
A Moving Story….
