What do I want more than anything else in the world?
Here's a persistent thought that keeps running through my brain like a kind of thought worm. For this thought to have meaning a few things have to be true. That there's this stable "I" that is wanting something. That there is this stable thing that is and always will be more desirable than anything else. That there is this knowable world that I have a complete enough knowledge of to be able to choose this stable thing. When I look at this thought from this angle, it seems pernicious. How can this though result in anything that a desperate wandering through the world trying to find this perfect thing for this stable I that will always be.
Or I can look at it from another angle. Yes whatever "I" created as the stable "I" is a construct, but it can be a useful construct. And I can't know everything in the world, but I can decide from what I do know the thing, the quality, the state of being that is the most important thing. The thing that holds all other things together. I can use this question to tease out my deepest and more abiding values.
This morning in meditation as I was deconstructing this thought, I settled into my Tan Tien, felt as I do more and more frequently these days, a kind of stillness. A fluid, but stable energy that could be a source of thriving peace and joy. A place that could be an engine/a feedback loop, a self propelling mechanism.
As I settled into the warmth I could feel it feed itself, it rose quietly and pleasantly up my body. I could see the kind of life that I could have so clearly. It would be a life where I chose this vitality, this joy, this peace as what I wanted more than anything, and the more I chose it, the more it would choose and nourish me.
We are not our abilities. We are our choices. I believe that's a direct quote from Harry Potter. But the magic is in the choices.
What this thought is telling me is that I need to choose. If I'm going to have a path through the wilderness, for me and for Ben, I need to choose and I need to commit to that choice. And I need to do that with peace and with joy.
