I paddle up the Santa Fe River. No one knows I'm here, no one. Raining. Thanksgiving Day. No words of gratitude here, none needed. Alone, no one needed. Water quiet, dark, alive. Nature unassuming, subtle. Yes, Love simplifies being in Love, with nothing and no meaning at all to this. Only a wild, mute aloneness, untouched, naked of time. Life is, no meaning, nothing to only this. Sweet simplicity, silent solitude, and no voice needing to say "Amen!" or choir to herald "Hallelujah!" anymore. This is enough, this meaningless communion without creed or church. Here, worship is not done... it is.
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The ego grasps for meaning, hence, creating a split between self and action, self and living. We believe we need a reason for acting, a meaning to justify our lives. In holy communion, which is true worship, action does not require a reason, nor does it need a meaning. Hence, to live means life lives. Life does not need meaning or justification because it is its meaning and justification.
Hence the following story ...
A question was posed to the Sage: "How best might I live for the glory of God?" Said the Sage, "Just live."
Why is life not enough for us? Why do we feel a need to decorate reality? Season our moments with extra seasoning? Can life be enough... for you? Is it possible to let this moment be your naked lover?
*Brian K. Wilcox. "Meetings with an Anonymouos Sage."
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We begin learning action by acting with intention. We are true to intention until it drops, returning to the root of action. Then, you are not outside living, you are the living. You cannot speak of your life, you have become life - which you were, anyway. There is unity in the moment of this pure action, for there remains only the action. See, life is living. Subject, object, and means become one, for they are one.
Hence, meditation is best when you are not meditating. You take time to meditate, and you meditate, but you do not meditate. Meditation happens, which is to say, "You happen."
This acting is like breathing - notice you do not have to breathe, for breath happens of itself. The thought, "I'm breathing," is only a thought imposed on breathing. Remove the "I am," and breathing continues, as it does during sleep, fainting, or while in a coma. When sleeping, who is sleeping? Life happened long before you showed up to think you have a life. Instead, life isyou... and many others, too. To say "I" means a thought arising from life, not you having a life to talk about. You are life, the expression of one life, even as one note is the sound of one song and all faces the appearance of a single face.
So, in meditation, in which you are not meditating, you are practicing the real way to live. In this way of life, reason for action is welcomed if needed, yet you do not live with a self-conscious reason. Reason can arise briefly and drop quickly. It becomes simply the action, so action remains uninterrupted. You become a bird singing without thinking, "I'm singing," or a bud opening without intending to open. Nothing in nature, being itself, says, "I must do this" or asks, "Why am I doing this?"
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The Christian and Jewish Scriptures speak of creation glorifying God (see Psalm 19.1ff). Hence, if so, it does that without intent or justification to do so. Each thing does it by being itself and, thereby, its doing is itself. A tree, then, being a tree is worship. So, any explanation is a step from the freedom and flow of enlightened action, and enlightened activity is simply activity.
If the thought of self arises when acting, this does not disrupt the action. You learn in meditation that the thought "I" is an act of consciousness, and this act is the act of the whole cosmos. The idea of self is action... doing keeps doing, which means no separation into doer and being done... hence, holy communion, for the doer is the action, and the action is the doer - both fully present in complete harmony. Thus, the Buddhist term often rendered "emptiness" is, also, "boundlessness." "Empty" is not a vacancy, it is a fullness.
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So, the Way, replete with thoughts, is thoughtless, and it is teeming with others, for you are alone. You can know this simply by paddling upon the waters of a river, cooking a meal, raking the leaves, kissing your lover, hiking a path, taking a shower, or yelling out "Hi!" to no one and nothing and laughing at the echo that revisits you - that is, when you act wholeheartedly. Then, the meaningless communion is felt as deeply meaningful. Finally, we learn the holy communion is already, and we, as self, get welcomed into it to enjoy ourselves as communion. We learn this communion is seen in any act of kindness, pure to the extent self is not intervening, only participating, in Love's efflugence.
*Use of photography is allowed accompanied by credit given to Brian K. Wilcox, and title and place of photograph.
*Brian's book, An Ache for Union: Poems on Oneness with God through Love, can be ordered through major online booksellers or the publisher AuthorHouse.
