What Is Here?

To become an individual, wholly and indivisibly me, how do we do this? Growing up, in my earlier youth brought me to believe that this endeavor of becoming an individual is one where the goal is to find a specific place in the outside world we all share. Whether that entails having some sort of clothing style, games/sports played, some type of hobby which entertains regularly, to find such a thing and stay put in it, like the old timers who have been able to keep the same career path in the same company for decades. However, I’ve come to see that this isn’t all that there is to this question of individuality, there’s a whole life within us, beyond the ordinary experience we try to share with everyone around us, which is typically never looked at, never given attention to, a part ignored. How can we be an individual, wholly indivisible, if we don’t know the whole of ourselves, inside and out?

So what do we continue to do? We attempt to sort our outside lives, feeding a sense that everything should be sought in the realm of worldly recognition. However, we never think about what it is to sort out our inner lives, our thoughts, emotions, and physical sensations. Why is it that these particular thoughts come into my space of consciousness? Why is it that I feel hate, or anger, lust, jealousy, sorrow, joy, or whatever it is towards whatever the particular event or person which I come into contact with? Why is it that my body aches, or I feel lazy, tired, heavy, or sore? Are these things capable of being sorted out? Are they sorted out by the attempt to fix this outer life of family, work, country, or this personal situation that I find myself in?

What is this relation between my outer life and my inner, because there is clearly this other, deeper life which exists, which if I am honest with myself, is in utter and complete chaos? I think to myself, “I should try to understand my coworker” or, “I am going to study harder this year” or, “I will finally say something to that cute girl” or even, “I will get right out of bed this morning” or, perhaps something more drastic, “I won’t contribute to war anymore, violence is wrong,” any thought which nags at us, but we don’t go through with it. We gossip about the coworker, skip class, continue ignoring whoever, stay in bed for hours, contribute to violence in ways we don’t even know. Why do we do these things? To continue doing the same old and to what end? To become famous, rich, to get a hand on the latest gaming system, or strongest drug, or someone new to sleep with.

Maybe we begin to see these things, but what do we do then? Maybe we find God or the Buddha, or perhaps, become some type of recluse, monk, hermit. Perhaps we become petty, sarcastic, spewing some sort of opinion as though we know that we are absolutely right in this opinion. We become addicted to some thought or drug. What is this thing we call life, truly? It is such an amazing thing which we all share. But we have become numb towards this planet’s happenings which so closely correspond to what we think we are. Who am I in all of this? How to see beauty in this life which is given?

So, I come to find myself in a deep state of questioning, one which calls for an opening to life, to the problems which I find myself in, to know them totally. Can I come to a quiet mind in order to listen and see what this life really is? Can I truly stop and look about, see a tree for what it is, a face for what it is? Can thought come to some sort of stoppage so that I can see my whole emotional relation, to feel what anger really is, to feel sorrow in the heart, to shy away from nothing which life shows me? I wish to find out how it is that I can become so sensitive to life that perhaps I can know it is all one, that it is all interconnected, that it shares this life in a unity typically unseen. Why is it that this mind separates, divides, between me and not-me?

The other day I was at a friend’s house for dinner, and, walking around in their backyard, I looked around and there was recognized this silence, a quiet behind all the chaos which seems to always happen perpetually. I fell into this inner silence, and looking around, I could see beauty, I could look at the flowers, the grass, the trees, the dog, fence, hear the birds and the bugs, and it was as though I melted into these things, or they melted into me. We were a unity, at peace with each other, exploring each others world’s. Can we ask ourselves what it is to look around and see that there is life around us like this, that there is something outside of myself, something which isn’t full of some ego, full of itself without a care for anything else? Not in some false way, like thinking to myself “I am kind” or, “I am a good person, I care for a lot of thing,” but truly, totally, be in complete connection. Can our mind, body, and soul be totally aware and connected towards what we are doing and what we are with, right now?

I ask any reader this because I need to know. I do not know. I wish to share this discovery of life because I am usually full of this foolishness in myself. I need help. I wish to know those things which are given in life to all of us. How is it possible to find love on this chaotic planet, orbiting this small star, far into the black infinitude of space, and surrounded by an unknown universe?