Once a spiritual seeker approached a great teacher and said, "I'd like to find my perfect mate."
The teacher responded with a question, "Are you happy?" she asked.
"Very much so! I have a nice house, car and a great job and I'm very grateful."
"Are you happy?" she asked again.
Surprised, the seeker responded, "Absolutely. I have wonderful teachers and I have studied a great deal. I've come a long way."
The teacher listened and looked gently at the student and asked again, "Are you happy?"
The seeker became irritated. He pointed a finger at the teacher accusingly, and said "You know, if I didn't know better I would think you were trying to get me to realize that I'm already happy so that I will forget all about my question!"
"Exactly," said the teacher.
We all tend to focus our attention on what we think is missing in our life.
It is as if the journey of life were equivalent to completing a puzzle. Sort of like arriving here on this planet, each of us with the incomplete set and with the missing pieces scattered across the world, waiting to be sought out, claimed and placed in their rightful juxtaposition.
Life becomes a continual search for the right pieces and a feeling of being unfinished until the last pieces arrive. To cope with this we rely on faith or action -- or both. And I'm not surprised that people have crisis of faith, or that action eventually exhausts us and fails to deliver.
Not because action or faith are not helpful, but because there is a fatal flaw in the fabric: The assumption that we are incomplete. We are not. There is no one on earth who came here needing therapy at birth.
No matter who we are or what has happened to us, we all possess capacities to live life that were never taught to us. Capacities that are a given from the time we arrive to the time we die. No one taught you love for example, you arrived with the ability to love. No one taught you intelligence, you came here with it and it is yours to use. And if you think about it, love, intelligence, wisdom, and life itself, will still be here long after we are each gone.
What this must mean is that you are not damaged, partial or in need of any of the true basic necessities. Assuming you define 'basic necessities' as these formless qualities, in other words as your ability to finish the puzzle -- not the puzzle pieces themselves.
When we focus on what is missing in life we will always find something. Yet, when we look inward and reflect on who we are as part of the universal intelligence we are born into, we always find that we are completely well-equipped to guide ourselves through life.
The teacher responded with a question, "Are you happy?" she asked.
"Very much so! I have a nice house, car and a great job and I'm very grateful."
"Are you happy?" she asked again.
Surprised, the seeker responded, "Absolutely. I have wonderful teachers and I have studied a great deal. I've come a long way."
The teacher listened and looked gently at the student and asked again, "Are you happy?"
The seeker became irritated. He pointed a finger at the teacher accusingly, and said "You know, if I didn't know better I would think you were trying to get me to realize that I'm already happy so that I will forget all about my question!"
"Exactly," said the teacher.
We all tend to focus our attention on what we think is missing in our life.
It is as if the journey of life were equivalent to completing a puzzle. Sort of like arriving here on this planet, each of us with the incomplete set and with the missing pieces scattered across the world, waiting to be sought out, claimed and placed in their rightful juxtaposition.
Life becomes a continual search for the right pieces and a feeling of being unfinished until the last pieces arrive. To cope with this we rely on faith or action -- or both. And I'm not surprised that people have crisis of faith, or that action eventually exhausts us and fails to deliver.
Not because action or faith are not helpful, but because there is a fatal flaw in the fabric: The assumption that we are incomplete. We are not. There is no one on earth who came here needing therapy at birth.
No matter who we are or what has happened to us, we all possess capacities to live life that were never taught to us. Capacities that are a given from the time we arrive to the time we die. No one taught you love for example, you arrived with the ability to love. No one taught you intelligence, you came here with it and it is yours to use. And if you think about it, love, intelligence, wisdom, and life itself, will still be here long after we are each gone.
What this must mean is that you are not damaged, partial or in need of any of the true basic necessities. Assuming you define 'basic necessities' as these formless qualities, in other words as your ability to finish the puzzle -- not the puzzle pieces themselves.
When we focus on what is missing in life we will always find something. Yet, when we look inward and reflect on who we are as part of the universal intelligence we are born into, we always find that we are completely well-equipped to guide ourselves through life.