T
IS AS IF A JUGGLER IS ENTERTAINING
on the wayside and we join the mob to look at the tricks he’s playing, which
is enjoyable. We get involved and forget where we were going. When we
remember this, we start the journey again. With a juggler, that might be
after minutes or hours, but in life’s journey it is not that easy to
disengage. It may take years, decades or even lifetimes to get out of even
one involvement and continue our journey again.
What does it imply? We miss what we are searching for by getting serious
where we shouldn’t be serious. Many misunderstand this to mean we should not
pay attention to anything in the world. That is not the issue. On the
contrary, those who do not learn to pay attention to things in the world
cannot pay attention in spiritual matters either. The exceptions are those
who are ascetic or renunciates, but the other ninety-nine percent have to
pay attention. How we learn to do this is different for each one.
Everyone is seeking joy or peace or satisfaction
in life. We want to be educated, be healthy, to have a family, a home, a
conveyance and other things to feel happiness and satisfaction. Or if we
seek some high pursuits, we do that to feel better, to know better, to be
better. So enlightenment ultimately joins with every pursuit. The idea: “I
want this” or “I want to do this” implies that we want these for our
happiness or satisfaction, for some kind of gratification. That gives us
pleasure. It may not stay with us, but the inner aim is that. We are seeking
that same goal through each and every thing we do except that we get very
serious about things that are impermanent.
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We have heard a thousand times that things of the world are transitory,
which the Vedas call illusion. But even then I would pose a question: What
is wrong with that? That is the way nature is made. The problem is that if
our joy is dependent upon the transitory, it does not last. If joy, peace
and happiness could be obtained from things outside of us, there would be
nothing wrong with being serious about such things. It is precisely because
happiness does not stay with us that we keep trying to find it. This is a
blessing of the Lord that the things of this world are transitory so that we
cannot get permanently stuck to them. It is not wrong to get pleasure or joy
out of something but we must remember that it
does not stay with us.
HIS
SHIFTING VALUATION
of the gratifications we seek is only because of the seriousness we have
given to these things, not because they are impermanent. Therefore we should
not condemn or abuse things of this world or the creation itself. Our
problem is that we are applying the mentality of the Iron Age to the
bounties of God’s creation. Even if you don’t bring in God, you have created
something; you are living in a certain way according to your choices. If we
could just bring our minds out from the ruts where we are stuck, we might
place our concentration and focus where it should be. Is it a matter of
practice? Maybe. But before practice I always feel the necessity of using my
own will. If you will to do this way, practice will follow. If you do
not change your will but only practice, you will not have much result.
Seeking the highest goal is ultimately the most beneficial.
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