Understanding

I don’t remember learning to swim. My older brothers tell me how I used to tag along with them to the riverbank when I had barely started walking. They say it was a wonder that I didn’t drown the way I would throw myself into the water. I have no memory of those days but because I am so much a part of it the water has never held any fear for me.

I say I have a history but I am full of these broken thoughts, like the water, being part of the mystery no one knows. Thinking back over this life I revel in who I am by understanding who I am not. By foregoing the past I plant myself firmly in the moment. Others understand where they are going by where they have been. By exalting in surprise I return to the mystery.

I once heard of a man who was said to be in possession of a great understanding far surpassing any other. Making many inquiries I discovered where this man lived. The journey was long, the way difficult and arduous. After months of travails I reached this man’s abode. He seemed to have been expecting me. Looking delighted to see me standing at his door he waved a hand for me to enter.

Without saying a word he brought refreshments. Sitting silently together we ate and we drank. When the meal was finished I got up and I left. When I arrived back home my wife inquired if I had found the man who I had been seeking for so long. I nodded my head. She asked if he had shared his great understanding with me. I smiled at her and looking into her eyes I could see she knew without being told.

The mystery exists where there is no space and time. I forgot the mystery to make a place for myself in the world. By counting the passing of time I have grown old. Looking into my mirror I understand I will soon return to the dust.

The mystery remains.

My brothers were all older than me. I watched them leave the family behind one by one until only my parents and I remained. Some of my brothers took wives while others just took off. When my time came to go I took a step out the door to never once look back. By always moving and yet being ever still I come to witness the mystery while basking in the silence that has grown deafening with the years.

Though I am a fully grown adult in the eyes of the world in the ways of the universe I was born only a minute ago. Since like the water I reflect the mystery I have been here forever. Because of this, I am both newly born yet I am older than any of the invented gods. Because of this, I do not speak and yet everyone listens. Though I am no partisan all parties believe in my catholicity. Though I play no instrument people move in harmony around me.

These cells that make up my body are so ancient, they are billions of years old. They began distinguishing this from that before the dawning of the first morning on earth while we were but scum floating on the surface of dark primordial oceans.

I say I inhabit this body and yet I understand nothing of its workings. I don’t know why this heart beats. I have no understanding of this blood that pumps through these arteries returning by these veins of its own accord to the source over and over.

This mind is a relative newcomer to all this. It has nothing to say to these primeval cells. Without thought, these cells have perpetuated themselves from the beginning and will continue long after this mind has fallen by the wayside.

By my actions I know the passing of time. I do not know when I will come to an end. The sun rises forth each day in the far off east and sets each evening in the extreme west. All things wait for the rising, appear in their places, and pass away with the setting. I move as acted upon awaiting the consummation of my course. I remain here unchanged.

I cannot know what has been assigned beforehand.

Without action, I sense the beginning of the mystery.

Before the earth came into being there was only the mystery, like a breath blowing over the water. Water is the mirror of the mystery. Try to watch it and it eludes my vision. Try to grasp it and my fist closes upon nothing.

Water seeps into the hardest rock through tiny unseen crevices. Upon freezing the water causes the rock to break asunder as springtime brings its appointed melt. Without substance, water enters where there is no room to enter. It does nothing and yet achieves everything.

Understanding this I see the value of non-action.

To instruct without speaking and to work without doing are the province of the few.