“If there is to be any peace it will come
through being, not having.”
–Henry Miller
I think this is
a key tenant of any authentic spiritual practice—essentially that our primary
job consists not in the doing that leads to having, but in being. Being the
love we wish to see in the world, being peace, etc. And yet what I see many
times in the published articles of ‘spiritual’ blogs is a disturbing reflection
of the larger culture’s tendency towards doing and acquiring.
Still being
promulgated is the notion that if we but attain a certain measure of
enlightenment, whether by means of meditating, figuring out how we want to feel
and pursuing that ideal, or by pursuing a more sanctified diet, we will have, at last, arrived. Presumably, just on the other side of attaining such ideals, we can
finally relax and be.
Contentment gets
short shrift in a life that is based on the acquisition of more, whether that
is more of our preferred feeling states, preferred food choices, or preferred
experiences in contemplation.
However, a
pervasive peace and happiness will never be possible if we are but trading in
our more secular ambitions for more ‘spiritual’ ones. Ambition is ambition no
matter how you dress it up and is often fueled by a dissatisfaction that needs to be closely scrutinized before reaching ambitiously for our
favourite spiritual opiate (veganism, three favourite soul desires, meditation,
whatever … ).
Peace only comes
through being and being requires keeping company with what is in any given moment in time, including our less desired feeling
states, less than perfect food choices or distracted mental states of mind.
These
uncomfortable states play an important role in our spiritual growth—they deepen
our awareness, they flex our heart muscle, and they transform us in ways that our
‘spiritual’ ambitions often promise, but are never really able to deliver on.
Any spiritual
practice that is built on high-grading our experiences lacks maturity,
sophistication and depth of understanding, so it will, therefore, also
inevitably lack substance, stability and vitality.
There is no
substitute for walking through the fire—for being love and being peace. And
being lies in direct opposition to doing. It is harder, requires more faith,
more personal strength of character and more patience as we move through all
the diversity of experience that life bestows, and any uncomfortable feelings
that accompany it.
Our only real
job, then, is to let life work on us. We need to listen more closely, more
discerningly, as life speaks to us without rushing to conclusions and/or making
rash decisions to ‘fix’ anything. Just be.
That way whatever
course of action we may eventually take, stands a much better chance of being synchronized with the natural rhythms of life in all their shimmering dark and light aspects.
