What is true everywhere, for everyone…all the time?
We are born, we appear, we get sick, we grow old and we die. That is true everywhere, for everyone…all the time. It is the cycle of life. Yet, in the propaganda of the mind, the ground of fabrication, we are drawn away from the true line of events over and over again. Instead, we look at the lines we draw, those imaginary lines drawn in the shifting sands of the material world of the mind.
We spend most of our time drawing these lines, pulling on them, reeling them in, darkening them, and continuing them in order to maintain the ignorance of our puny view. We insist. We prolong. We protract. We believe.
“Look! Look! Look!” says the sage.
We ask. Is this admonition enough?
“Look! Look! Look!” says the sage.
But our puny view wants more when we look, we want to look for some entertainment, we want to look like somebody, and we want to look acceptable.
“Look! Look! Look!” says the sage.
We look for more.
“Look! Look! Look!” says the sage.
No matter what the circumstances, we are advised to look, look, look.
“Look! Look! Look!” says the sage.
There is no direction given, no proposition, no hint of what to look for or what to look at.
“Look! Look! Look!” says the sage.
Here is a story of a man in misery who goes to the sage for some advice.
“I am so sad and unhappy,” the man declares as he looks into the face of the sage.
The sage nods his head and whispers, “I see.”
“Yes. I am miserable.”
Again the sage nods his head and repeats. “I see.”
The man decides to define and draw out his sadness.
“I am miserable because I want to go into business.”
“Look! Look! Look!” the sage begins.
The man is uncertain, does not know what the sage means for him to do. The man decides to further explain his situation.
“I am miserable because I want to go into business, but I have no money.”
“Look! Look! Look!” says the sage again.
The man wants to clarify further.
“I am miserable because I have no money to go into business. If I had money, I could go into business.”
“Look! Look! Look!” says the sage.
The man takes a deep, coarse breath and begins to feel anger in his misery.
“I don’t think you are listening to me. I am sad and miserable because I have no money to go into business and I have no way of getting any money to go into business.”
“Look! Look! Look!” says the sage.
Now the man begins to forget about his sadness and misery of having no way to get the money to go into business and begins to raise his voice at the sage.
“You are not listening to me. I am telling you I have no way to get the money to go into business!”
“Look! Look! Look!” says the sage.
The man begins to feel a burning in his body and in his mind. His sadness and misery begin to be overtaken by the fire of anger and hate. He wants to yell and scream at the sage.
“Look!” the man shouts. “Listen to me! You are not listening to me! All you keep saying is this stupid thing….look, look, look…what in hell does that have to do with the fact that I am miserable because I have no way to get the money to go into business.”
“Look! Look! Look!” says the sage.
The man crumples over in an agony of rage, sorrow and misery. He begins to weep. His hands are on the floor in fists. He wants to pound something. He is as the saying goes, beside himself. The sage looks at him and touches the top of his head and says,
“Look! Look! Look!” says the sage.
This is the Way to have a simple life. This is the Way of simplicity.
“Look! Look! Look!”
What is true everywhere, for everyone…all the time?
Reference for Nothing in Life Has Lines Mike Sibley, Drawing from Line to Life.