Conversation

"I just sat there wondering what exactly life encompasses. Getting a job so that I'm able to meet an array of financial responsibilities. Hoping I will have enough disposable income to keep pace with the Joneses. It's amusing, sorta. Exchanging hours of your life for money. Permitting someone else to tell you what an hour, or a year, of your life is worth. Then each morning, fighting fatigue and traffic, you drag your ass into the office trying to prove that your life is worth more. And, maybe during your one hour lunch break, you sit there wondering if this is what your life is supposed to be. Your life as a corporate acolyte. Your life defined by your job, vehicle, address, Pottery Barn and Banana Republic," I said.

"I began questioning what matters and what doesn't. 'Be ye lamps unto yourselves.' Those are supposed to be the Buddha's last words to his followers. You know, question authority? But then you find that you're questioning everything, including whether there is a such thing as authority. Or, if there is, should we reject it as a concept. It can all get pretty confusing. So, anyway, I started reading different books on philosophy, religion and spirituality. Although stated in differing ways, most stated the same empty, dull, apochryphal platitudes concerning existence," I continued. I began to wonder if I was boring Samantha to tears, but she asked why I began meditating. Plus she still looked interested in my random, meandering answer.

"I picked up Alan Watts' 'The Way Of Zen' and he explains that Zen is a way of liberation, not a religion or a philosophy. It's a way of finding the truth of our existence. It's funny, the hardest thing to do is to sit there and not think about anything at all. To completely quiet your mind. You never realize how much it races until you try to make it stop. It's crazy."

"I guess like when you can't fall asleep? You just can't turn it off," she asked.

"Exactly like that until you get better at it. So that's why I started. I want to know the truth of my existence. I know it can't be the sum of what I consume or own. That's too bleak and boring an existence for a human being."

"There's always the possibility that you will find the truth and not like it. Then it will be too late to turn and run. I mean, once you know something it's hard to deny, from that point forward, that it doesn't exist. Like 2+2=4, the sky's blue, etc.You can't deny those truths any longer," she said. I nodded and admitted that the thought does give me pause. What will I find? I have no idea, maybe that conforming blindly to society is antithetical to our true existence. We'll see.