Recently someone handed me a 50-page pile of paper that I needed to skim. I went through it, jotting down the critical bits and discarding the rest, page-by-page, on the floor. What began as a consolidated unit of importance ended as a strewn collection of ideas, paper, and ink. As I tossed it in the recycling bin, I said a prayer that this pile's journey would transform it to compost, help grow a tree, and do its tiny part to heal the hurting, heating planet.
From the Buddhist viewpoint, as goes the stack of paper, so go I. This philosophy teaches that we are a loosely assembled pile of form, feeling, energy, and awareness rather than the consolidated, separate unit of Self importance we believe ourselves to be.
While this assembly of Self is immeasurably useful for survival, suffering ensues when we believe in its separateness all too fully – when we forget the impermanence of this heap of humanity and invest in hanging on to what ultimately cannot be held.
Life will scatter us, one way or the other. May we live kindly and compassionately while we can, and be wise to the momentariness of it all.
~ Annie Moyer