Koan #2. I want to be with them - They do not want me
This week was something new. I faced three koans and had no choice other then to solve them.
The first one, "I want to be with someone - This someone doesn't want what I can give" was described in "Heart the world"
The third one, "Right and Wrong" was analysed yesterday, here and here.
Time for the second one.
But first things first. Let us define the notions.
By a koan I mean a personal/general problem or a question which is so crucially important in one's life that unless this question is solved the person feels that he has no right to go on.
Bu solving a koan I mean finding a solution, which in it's turn means an idea after which a koan is no longer significant. It feels as if some knot has been undone. Do not mix solutions and consolations.
By consolation I mean any idea that explains why this koan should exist and why everything should be exactly this way.
[Read more]
On Wednesday I faced one more challenge. I had about fourteen hours (some of those I wanted to devote to sleep) to rewrite my need to belong to a group - one of the basic needs, according to Maslow.
But let me describe the situation briefly.
There is a group of intensely communicating people consisting of three people. Let me call them here the Elder, the Neutral and the Key. The Neutral because I don't know this person much. The Key, because this person made the whole situation possible.
I was perceiving this group as somewhat elite. From my point of view through their communication they were doing something much more important than performing some everyday routine. The potential of these meetings was enormous. I just know that, inspired by the Elder, the Neutral and the Key can change many things significantly. And for the good.
So, naturally, it was a great honor for me to be invited by the Elder to join them. It became a koan when the Key, who introduced me to the Elder, and showed how brilliant the Neutral is, let me know than he wouldn't want me to be there.
My ego was safe and sound under the protection of Anahata, so I was not disturbed by that phrase. I agreed not to go. But I just understood that in fourteen hours I would face this group anyway and the Elder might ask me, why I didn't join them. I didn't have an answer to this question, any answer I would like.
I found or was told some marvelous consolations.
- they had their own language that had been elaborated and polished during long time of communication, they had special topics to discuss and with an extra person present their communication wouldn't be efficient. And I wouldn't dare bother them so;
- I had other things to do. Even if those things couldn't be as important as this meeting, at least I had my mountain, more beautiful than any other and so on. A rule from now on: do not use your mountain as a consolation. You'll start hating it. You can make a step higher only when you are complete and good, when the koans are solved.
- I love them. I salute their being. I don't need anything from them. They are brilliant and beautiful just as they are. I am honored enough to watch them from the distance.
You see, consolations are tempting.
I had fourteen hours to come up with a solution that would be a thousand times better.
Before I went to bed I realized that the need to belong to a group is one of the fundamentals of my personality. One of my earliest memories: I'm in the kindergarten, I am tidying up the room. Everyone is outside, playing, but I'm preparing the room for them in hope they will accept me in future game. In hope that I will earn their recognition.
It was always there. I was always the first one willing to prepare food for everybody, to arrange and prepare space for their activity. I even participated in that activity. In the summer camp I even got a diploma for carrying heavy stuff for musical performances. I played myself but preparing the stage for others seemed as something worth doing. I spent my first night awake packing musical stuff before our departure. I thought I earned this way a right to be with the person I was in love with then. Actually, that was one of the most romantic nights in my life. Packing others' stuff with my Beloved. Watching the sunrise.
I had to deal with it.
I got up the next day, feeling the tension in my mind growing. Four hours before the X hour. I didn't come up with anything before or during breakfast, I had less than an hour to think before I had to go but nothing.
But on the way to the station something happened.
There was a lawn, half was under the trees, half was open. Half was yellow with fallen leaves, half was green. Of course, some of yellow leaves were on the green part. And there was a man with a broom, just on the verge of yellow and green parts. He was sweeping leaves from the green part back to the yellow part. He was so beautiful that I stopped and told him how beautifully and gracefully and skillfully he was sweeping the leaves.
It happened then.
There are no groups, elite or not. The mind is like a broom sweeping the leaves from one part of the lawn to another but let the wind rise and the leaves will be scattered.
It's all in my head.
Thus the koan was solved. It took more than a half of my personal energy. During next several hours I was physically exhausted to the extent that when I finally faced the "group" I was on the verge of collapsing.
But I did it.
And the Elder told me, 'Please, join us the next time".
Thank you.
The first one, "I want to be with someone - This someone doesn't want what I can give" was described in "Heart the world"
The third one, "Right and Wrong" was analysed yesterday, here and here.
Time for the second one.
But first things first. Let us define the notions.
By a koan I mean a personal/general problem or a question which is so crucially important in one's life that unless this question is solved the person feels that he has no right to go on.
Bu solving a koan I mean finding a solution, which in it's turn means an idea after which a koan is no longer significant. It feels as if some knot has been undone. Do not mix solutions and consolations.
By consolation I mean any idea that explains why this koan should exist and why everything should be exactly this way.
[Read more]
On Wednesday I faced one more challenge. I had about fourteen hours (some of those I wanted to devote to sleep) to rewrite my need to belong to a group - one of the basic needs, according to Maslow.
But let me describe the situation briefly.
There is a group of intensely communicating people consisting of three people. Let me call them here the Elder, the Neutral and the Key. The Neutral because I don't know this person much. The Key, because this person made the whole situation possible.
I was perceiving this group as somewhat elite. From my point of view through their communication they were doing something much more important than performing some everyday routine. The potential of these meetings was enormous. I just know that, inspired by the Elder, the Neutral and the Key can change many things significantly. And for the good.
So, naturally, it was a great honor for me to be invited by the Elder to join them. It became a koan when the Key, who introduced me to the Elder, and showed how brilliant the Neutral is, let me know than he wouldn't want me to be there.
My ego was safe and sound under the protection of Anahata, so I was not disturbed by that phrase. I agreed not to go. But I just understood that in fourteen hours I would face this group anyway and the Elder might ask me, why I didn't join them. I didn't have an answer to this question, any answer I would like.
I found or was told some marvelous consolations.
- they had their own language that had been elaborated and polished during long time of communication, they had special topics to discuss and with an extra person present their communication wouldn't be efficient. And I wouldn't dare bother them so;
- I had other things to do. Even if those things couldn't be as important as this meeting, at least I had my mountain, more beautiful than any other and so on. A rule from now on: do not use your mountain as a consolation. You'll start hating it. You can make a step higher only when you are complete and good, when the koans are solved.
- I love them. I salute their being. I don't need anything from them. They are brilliant and beautiful just as they are. I am honored enough to watch them from the distance.
You see, consolations are tempting.
I had fourteen hours to come up with a solution that would be a thousand times better.
Before I went to bed I realized that the need to belong to a group is one of the fundamentals of my personality. One of my earliest memories: I'm in the kindergarten, I am tidying up the room. Everyone is outside, playing, but I'm preparing the room for them in hope they will accept me in future game. In hope that I will earn their recognition.
It was always there. I was always the first one willing to prepare food for everybody, to arrange and prepare space for their activity. I even participated in that activity. In the summer camp I even got a diploma for carrying heavy stuff for musical performances. I played myself but preparing the stage for others seemed as something worth doing. I spent my first night awake packing musical stuff before our departure. I thought I earned this way a right to be with the person I was in love with then. Actually, that was one of the most romantic nights in my life. Packing others' stuff with my Beloved. Watching the sunrise.
I had to deal with it.
I got up the next day, feeling the tension in my mind growing. Four hours before the X hour. I didn't come up with anything before or during breakfast, I had less than an hour to think before I had to go but nothing.
But on the way to the station something happened.
There was a lawn, half was under the trees, half was open. Half was yellow with fallen leaves, half was green. Of course, some of yellow leaves were on the green part. And there was a man with a broom, just on the verge of yellow and green parts. He was sweeping leaves from the green part back to the yellow part. He was so beautiful that I stopped and told him how beautifully and gracefully and skillfully he was sweeping the leaves.
It happened then.
There are no groups, elite or not. The mind is like a broom sweeping the leaves from one part of the lawn to another but let the wind rise and the leaves will be scattered.
It's all in my head.
Thus the koan was solved. It took more than a half of my personal energy. During next several hours I was physically exhausted to the extent that when I finally faced the "group" I was on the verge of collapsing.
But I did it.
And the Elder told me, 'Please, join us the next time".
Thank you.