Zen and the Art of Lost and Found /Chapter 5

Everyone Sees Their Own World For Their Own Reasons. Their 'Own World' And 'Own Reasons' Are Steeped In Terms Of Self-Preservation Protection. Protecting The Self From The Self's Past Experience.

I noticed one interesting thing; I have always had "a notion" ... a belief ... that I knew "how things should be working" ... for me and oddly enough ... "for everyone else too."

This "knowingness" changes from time to time but I still hold the position that "I should know."


Sometimes "my knowingness" stretches me into a place of appreciating that "I ... 'in-fact' don't know" ... that place of 'in-fact' ... I have come to find out ... is a place in my consciousness of knowing ... actually, it is just the back door to attempting to understand something that I can not quite get my head around ...


When I stop and think about it for a moment ... the great spiritual leaders didn't necessarily have lives that I would want to emulate ... take Christ for instance...


 He never reached his earning potential ...


 He never really had steady work ...


 He wandered from town to town ... talking to people ... I have to wonder aloud ... were backpacks invented yet?


 He never really learned a trade ... and in particular ... never learned the trade his father wanted to pass on to him ...


 He was always living off the gifts and handouts from others ...always on Social Assistance ... so to speak ...


 He never really got the respect of his peers ... especially the insiders in his so-called chosen profession ... they despised him if the truth were to be known and were responsible for his undoing.


 He had difficulty choosing friends ...those he did choose ... weren't exactly loyal ... and they did this "not being loyal thing" at exactly the wrong point in time ... The Garden of Gethsemane ... Peter ... Judas ... etc ...


 He had difficultly ... from a certain perspective ... in having successful and meaningful relationships with women ... could not get a girlfriend to save his life.


 His mother never really got it ... what it was that he was up to for the longest time ...


 Yet here am I ... firmly believing that I need all these things and more ... just to be spiritual...

... I Think NOT...

Answer These in Your Journal ... In Long Hand


1) What does unmanageability mean to you?


2) Do you insist on having your-way regardless?


3) What effect has your insistence on having things your-way had on your relationships?


4) Are you able to carry out your daily responsibilities without becoming overwhelmed by your life and all its happenings?


5) How has this overwhelmed thing affected your life?


6) Do you seem to naturally maintain a crisis in your mind?


7) How has your hyper vigilance affected you and your life style?


8) Do you ignore signs that something may be seriously wrong with your life circumstance, health or with your family, or relationships ... thinking things will somehow magically work out?


9) Do you have temper tantrums or react to your feelings in other ways that lower your self-respect or sense of dignity?


10) Can you describe in detail.