Blog 37 Examining What’s In The Balance (Gary)

  It’s easy to convince ourselves that spending time in excitement is the answer.  If we can feel really alive then we must be alive.  It’s how we define this feeling of being alive that starts things off.  We can get excited about possessions, expensive toys, and that is not where our relaxation lives.  We appreciate the way the world goes away when we truly relax.  Somehow we need to pay for this relaxation.  It often comes to us after a day of strenuous labor, or a challenging day on The Hill, a good sweat, a hot shower, a moment to regard the outcome of the effort.  We ask if that’s what it takes to make material desires leave our minds.  Monks of every persuasion doing the work of a sacred place come to mind.  It makes us wonder if there is a “stressless” desire, and if that is what it means to be without desires.  Apparently not, as we can easily find the word stressful and yet stressless is not in our dictionary.  How can we hold on to this “desirelessness” (also not in the dictionary), this basic concept of Buddhism.

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