Recently, I had a chance to invite a few demons to tea.  Don’t you find it interesting that the people who walk into our lives are not as scary as the mind-creations of what they represent?  About a month ago I agreed to step out into the wider sangha after a number of years of keeping a discrete distance.  The back story is pointless – or as a friend would say, “affaire classée” – case closed.  What matters is that in the month leading up to the Great Event, I was challenged to a full body contact with my emotions and an opportunity to dig deep.  There were some interesting observations:

(1) I hate hating.  It’s a waste of time.  So, economically-speaking, I do have to wonder why I invest so much in doing it.

(2) I get angry about being angry.  It’s a vicious cycle.  So, calorically-speaking, I do have to wonder why I consume so much of it.

(3) I love my suffering.  No one’s suffering is more important than mine.  So, priority-wise, I wonder why everyone else doesn’t set down their woes to make room for mine.

(4) I am co-dependent with my demons.  We’ll be attending a local chapter of DA (Delusions Anonymous) as soon as the least delusional of us figure out how to start one.

And on the day itself:

Practice transcends all the bull shit.  It always boggles my mind.  No matter how tattered and worn the threads of my emotional life are, if I’m just willing to sit with the tangled mess in my lap, it begins to weave itself together into some coherence, some centered core from which the most appropriate response arises.

Thank you for practising,

Genju