The absence of struggle. Alone, but not lonely.
Today, I walked across campus to the Leifson Physics building to turn in my lab report. I hadn't eaten anything all day, and I was a tad hungry, so I went to the Ansari Business building and bought a veggie burrito, a cheese quesadilla, and a Tazo Organic Iced Green Tea (with spearmint and lemongrass). I saw that the area outside the small Mexican restaurant I had bought my food items was empty, so I decided to sit there and eat my food. I was alone.
At this point in a blog post, I usually go off on how horrible it is to be alone and everything turns melodramatic. That isn't going to happen this time.
So anyway, I was alone. I could hear faint noises coming from the kitchen from whence my delicious meal was just produced, but other than that and the occasional person passing on their way to or from class, it was just me and my food. It was peaceful, you could say.
Sitting there, I realized something. Rather, I un-realized everything. Everything became a wonderful illusion around me. I was there, yet not there at all. I experienced a moment of Zen, if you will. I had forgotten how beautiful I am, alone. Alone, I have no one to please--no need to do or say or act any certain way. I can be myself, which is in reality (or non-reality) the absence of self, and enjoy a burrito without anxiety. I can let go of everything I've struggled so hard to obtain and keep hold of. My identity as an individual becomes irrelevant, and I can let go. It feels so good to let go.
We, as egoists, are terribly terrified of letting go. We have this silly need to BE something, to create an identity for ourselves--to be a unique personality in a uniformly blank sea of faces. This is what makes us human, I guess. Our uniquely human social/existential anxiety pushes us to do uniquely human things. It is doubtful that any other animal species on earth shares these same anxieties--at least not to the degree that we experience them.
They (the animals) are born free. We (the humans) are born in captivity. We need people, leaders, to show us the way to freedom. So we create Moses and Christs and Muhammeds and Buddhas to tell us how to be free. Unfortunately, many people simply trade their shackles of wild anxiety for chains more tame, more manageable. Instead of following the examples set forth by the God-men, they set them up as objects of worship--as masters to serve--and grovel at shrines of their own slavery, built by their own misguided hopes and dreams. They forget the Divine within themselves, and instead glorify false idols. Surely, we need these God-men to show us that there is a way out--that our earthly prisons are not inescapable and our anxieties not permanent--but that's all they should be used for: to show us that THERE IS a way, not to show us THE way. We must find the way ourselves, and when we find our own way, we will finally be Free. We will be Home.
In the words of sometime-philosopher, sometime-madman, Friedrich Nietzsche:
"You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist."
There are infinite paths here in life. We are constantly hopping from one to another, and always we hope for the best. Today, I found myself on my own uniquely correct path for a while. I found myself at Home. I can't stay here forever, I know, but that's alright. I'll struggle again, worry again, and go crazy again, but that's alright. We live, we eat burritos, and we die. And it's all alright.
