I posted the quote below in Facebook today, in part, as a caution against running away from life, from one’s “self,” from suffering. In the inquiries, we seek not to avoid or resist anything. No self doesn’t mean “I’m outta here, out of this.” It’s not a way to hide from or avoid life. Many forms of seeking are actually an attempt to evade experience, ironically to deny who we really are, and further, to bypass the grittiness of life itself. Seeking essentially means that we are looking elsewhere for more of the juicy and less of the stench. It’s all right here where you are. Get your hands dirty and your feet wet. Jump in.

Take the fullness and the emptiness experienced and bring it back to the marketplace. Let the emptiness open up the infinite possibility inherent in any apparent other, any circumstance, because you can no longer judge either. Let the fullness enhance your senses, so that everything and everyone is imbued with exquisite beauty.

There is nothing to gain, and nothing to lose for “me,” for “you.” So the good news is you really can’t be hurt (there is no one there to be hurt). Curiously, what you might have hoped to gain is what you end up giving back (to give and to receive are the same in this oneness). There is no bad news.

There can be a tendency, if not the veiled intent, to transcend the world, and all its misery, along this “spiritual journey.” This is a radical form of resistance. The etymology of “resist” means to stand in opposition.

Acceptance is the antidote. The origin of the word “accept” is from the same derivation as capacity, or to be large enough to hold. Can you be large enough to hold the bitter and the sweet? Or is opposition to what is the source of misery?

“To be in the world, but not of it” is not a way out. God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son…You are the God and the Son and the world. Be in the world. Go towards all you wish to escape. Let courage (of the heart) be the path.