My Song...: As Miserable As Ever...

24 March 2009

As Miserable As Ever...

Or More So, is all I'd add...

Heard a story about a monk living in a Zen Monastery.

His fellow students/travelers heard this young one had reached the state of Enlightenment.
Curious to learn more, they grouped and found their way to their friend...
"So," one monk asks reverently, "we hear you have reached an enlightened state..."

"Yes," the pupil answered, with a genuine smile and a brightness to his eyes his brethren had not noticed before.
And he stood after the one word, continuing to smile.

Finally impatient for a reply, all of his peers began questioning at the same time:
"How?"
"What is it like?"
"How does it feel?"

Same smile, same eye-gleam, the monk had only one response:

"As miserable as ever."

Folks, I'm with the Monk on the misery scale. Seriously.
Or I may have him bested there...
My question is-- "WHERE THE F#*K IS THIS LIGHT?"!!!

Any of you folks seen from this monk's perspective?
Anybody chanced or figured upon the REASON we are here?

I got excuses galore-- what I'm after now is REASON-- solid, tangible REASON for what the hell I am supposed to be accomplishing here (as in On This Earth...).

Don't come back with some buls$h!t about some Higher Purpose or other spiritual tripe... today ain't the sell-day for that rigamarole.
WHAT.
WHY.

These are my questions.

Peanut Gallery? Your Turn!!

Slainte.

Cygnus

9 comments:

Catman said...: Cygnus,

"And remember, no matter where you go, there you are." is a quote attributed to Confucious. I think the first time I ever heard the quote, it was George Carlin in one of his skits.

It always stuck with me, and I've ruminated on it often.

My thoughts on the quote center around that many people spend their lives running back and forth never really paying attention to what is happening right here, right now.

They either look to the past or to the future, not realizing that what is now, is soon the past, and what is the future is all too soon now.

If they had looked at now, when it was "now", then maybe they wouldn't need to look to the past to somehow clarify it or improve on it, or regret it. If they would pay attention to the now, rather than some imagined "perfect" future, then perhaps "now" might be good enough and not become a past that is regretted.

I'll be hitting 45 this summer, and it amazes me how quickly the last 27 years have breezed by.

When I look back, I get this collage of images, sensations, sounds and voices. Scents, feelings and impressions. It is difficult for me to pick individual things out, but sometimes I can.

Does the past make me sad, or regretful? I'd have to say, "no". Maybe "wistful" is a better word. There are some people, some places, and some things I did not experience fully. Opportunities that will never be again.

Blade Runner is one of my all time favorite movies. A character in the movie, Roy Baty, a synthetic human (Replicant), played by Rutger Hauer, is dying. His last act is to save the life of a cop who is tasked to kill him. Roy's last monologue is:

"I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.”

If you've never seen it, this powerful scene is available here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTzA_xesrL8

Perhaps that is the meaning of life. To experience what is, not what was, or is hoped to be. To be here, now, ready to carry the moment forward into eternity.

Just my two cents.; March 24, 2009 at 4:05 AM
Cygnus MacLlyr said...: Carlin is a God...

"the journey is the destination", Catman?

I can agree. Doesn't help in the moment-to-moment struggles...
Or can it?

Perspective, I s'ppose...

Thanks, Cat...

Good to have ya back, Bro..

MY $0.02..

:D; March 24, 2009 at 4:14 AM
Dawn Parsons Smith said...: I agree with the Catman...I find that when I am feeling that way...and lately, I have really been feeling this way...it's because I am not living in the present. I am looking back on what might have been,if only, etc. Or I am looking ahead at what I want and how to get it. What I am not doing is focusing on the moment...

It really is "in the moment" that we find peace. I literally just try to take life second by second and just be "in it to win it" as my smart 12 year old Leo son likes to remind me. (especially this last week...life was a huge suckfest for me last week...)

Hang in there, Cygnus, dear friend...you may not have control over what happens to you in life, but you have complete control in how you choose to respond to it and that is where your power lies. Sometimes it is in shadow (or fallow) times that our souls are preparing to make a huge leap into the light!; March 24, 2009 at 7:11 AM
Jess (Ozark Momma) said...: Ah Cyg...feelin' put upon today?

Purpose? We have a purpose here? Mine changes from moment to moment. Two minutes ago, my purpose/reason for being was coffee...right now, it's to type this up for you...in two minutes it will be peeling the hard boiled eggs that are cooling on the stove so the screamers will stop screaming about food (I am a delinquent mother).

I join the group of 'right now' but then again I am a full on Aquarius...now is what we do best!

Hope the day shines brighter for you Cyg and you find your reason!!; March 24, 2009 at 2:45 PM
Cygnus MacLlyr said...: Bee and Rose-- thank you for the words.
You are so right. The future, and past, too, have been bogging me down.

May be time to get back tothose deep meditative sessions that worked so much into my life (or life into my existence, to follow the theme)...

Great words, Lady-- again, thank you!; March 24, 2009 at 11:24 PM
Cygnus MacLlyr said...: Ozark Momma,

Seems you're doing what the two above recommend-- the moment.

:D Mayhap we don't have purpose... maybe being here, BEING in general, IS the Purpose-- the Journey Is the Destination...

Thanks, kind Lady, for your sweet words...; March 24, 2009 at 11:28 PM
Ken said...: ...i'm the reason,BandR,OM, and all the girls are the reason,Jim's the reason,Catman,Bullseye and all of/but not limited to,yer followers is the reason...maybe all of us coming together is the reason...

...sounds like most folks relish the question itself...not the 'answer'...; March 25, 2009 at 3:00 AM
Cygnus MacLlyr said...: Kenneth The conquerer, My man, i finally caught upwith the e-mail/comment tag you mentioned earlier! hehe...

And you, sir, are also right. And I most prefer to the question itself.

The Journey...

Here's to traveling in good ken, Ken...

Thanks, Bro...; March 25, 2009 at 6:22 AM
Lydia said...: You and your uncle have all the monk stories. At least yours has an ending. Or...does it? ;)

I don't know where the light is, and I wont come to you with stories of a higher purpose and so on, because I don't believe there is a higher purpose to this. One guru used to call it a mummery and that about sums it up. From all that I've learned, there is no reason for any of it, so don't beat yourself up or spin your tail looking for one.

I don't know your religious or spiritual background if any, but it might help to compare our lives to a dream. Sometimes we have good dreams, sometimes bad, and sometimes downright miserable. Nightmares even. The good thing is that we do eventually wake up, and the dream is over. But there is no purpose to it, it's just a dream. Good or bad, it's just a dream. It's temporary. Just like life and anything in it. All temporary.

So what do we do? Well, your friends have given you good advice about living in the now and so on, but this is difficult at best. Particularly when you're upset over an issue, because ALL upset comes from past experience and future expectation there is no way to live in the now at that point except to suffer. Right?

But there is something you can try when you feel this way about life. Surrender to whatever seems to be going on and let it pass. Just let go and let it happen. And it will. All things in life do. But when we fight them, they linger and torture us by giving us more of what we do not want. It does not mean to give up. Just means to see it for what it is and then go on.

Well, I don't mean to take up all this space, just happens to be a subject I like to talk about. :)

Hope you're feeling better by now!
lydia; March 25, 2009 at 12:29 PM