Some months ago, one of my quiet thinking bouts was interrupted for a fraction of a second. I saw myself alone and needing no one. I could travel the world alone and be very happy. The it was gone as quickly as it came. I didn’t realize it had to do with Freedom, which is a topic that occupies my mind quire a lot.
It was always with me, in the background. Thinking about it did nothing to bring it closer and actually prevented a greater understanding of it.
Recently I’ve been re-reading Confessions of a Kamikaze Cowboy. I’d had the book since ’91 or ’92 and though I had read sections of it many times, I had only read it through when I first got it and again in 2000. I had gravitated toward the New Hampshire part each time I picked it up without considering that the entire book is filled with nuggets of wisdom. It seems to flow in a more cohesive way that I remember but that could be a change in my understanding. Also, I wasn’t a particular Dirk Benedict fan early on when I ordered the book but I was a big fan of the original Battlestar Galactica so I thought it might be fun to read. The part of the book that kept returning me to it made me a very respectful and admiring fan of it’s author.
Now I find myself near the end of the book where the talk is about relationships, that is, men and women. Then, as I see it again, it is brought into my understanding: I can be alone and be happy. I can live alone, needing no one to prop up my life. If we need someone to “complete” us, and we are taught all our lives that we do, plus it fills our waking thoughts and haunts our dreams – that is a dependency. There can never be Freedom where there is dependency. I see this so well in the outer but couldn’t get it past my psychological beliefs.
Beyond the world of thought there is a place where Freedom and Wholeness reign. It’s the place we long to be, to live, but we look for it continually in another person, blocking the one thing we want from actually coming forth in our lives. What a dreadful thing we do to ourselves. The pain we have to go through before we turn toward this Immensity shakes us to our roots. It seems we need the pain to turn us around.
Something comes to mind that I saw in a TV show eons ago. It may have been a religious show. The only thing I remember is a tapestry that was shown. It was a picture of a regal lion, King of the Beasts, and lying on the ground in front of him was a snake. The lion had his right front paw on the snake’s head. The snake was called The Great Deceiver and he had been conquered by the King. The Great Deceiver is psychological thought which divides itself into two, as the thinker and thought, when it is actually one. Factual thought is just that – your name, where you live, 2+2=4, the Mississippi River flows into the ocean. etc. It is knowledge that is necessary for daily living. Psychological thought consists of all the conditioning, propaganda, sentimentality; greed; superiority, inferiority; all the hype and dogma that swirls within our brain. In the former, thought functions as the instrument that it truly is. In the later, it functions as an “entity” – an illusion, a false positive. The great deception, the false, the abstract that controls us, are the lies by which we live our lives.
I’m learning about the proper way to eat because of this book. It also gives me food for thought. I don’t need anyone to prop me up; I can walk alone. Though having someone whose spiritual growth is twin to your own, to stand beside you must cause your heart to soar – and if you and that other have climbed to heights known only to the few, then the shared ecstasy, sweetness, and joy must be without measure. However, your happiness doesn’t depend on this. You can be alone and be happy. What an absolutely magnificent, factual, thrilling thing to learn! Makes my face happy!
I’m so grateful this book found it’s way out into the world. And to me.
Ojai22: Lessons Learned 