Report 53

Bill Moyers interviews Barry Lopez: http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/04...0/profile.html
A really beautiful interview about the koan of life.

I feel a bit unprepared about how to answer this question -- kind of a broad issue, isn't it?  So I'll just make a minor remark about what's coming up for me now (today), and leave it at that...

The truth is, life doesn't feel like the koan it once did, in the sense that for the most part, I don't think of myself as confused anymore -- I don't think of myself as real, or the situation as real, or the walls as real, etc.  There's a comfort level with the fact that "I" am not doing this, because I am not separate -- if Guan Yin does it, or if the forest nymphs do it, or the non-dimensional belly button powers do it, that's exactly the same as "me" doing it, all in an instant that never really happens in time.  Enlightenment is definitely over and done with and seems to be quite definitely the case for all (non) beings in all (non) time.

And yet!  There are so many little ways I like to steal from myself -- not quite telling the truth; holding aloof from beauty and horror, desires and fears; preferring "study" and "self-improvement" over the actuality of living.  I spend a lot of time foolishly wrestling with these tendencies, forgetful of the fact that it's a willingness to forgive these flaws that reveals the intimacy that has always been there, the willingness to value even these mistakes.