"I am going"
We all have this sentence in our head sometimes. We want to live everything behind, our life, our family, our job, our friends, everything. "I am going" we think.
Yet, even when we travel to the 4 corners of the world, there is never anywhere to go. The real travel happens inside. The only real journey is a love story with ourself. A self from which there is never any escape possible. A self we can only learn to grow like a flower.
"I am going" we say.
So we get a new wife, we make more children, we change car and friends, we get a new haircut.
We repeat the same mistakes, again and again, because we never take the time to really go inside. We get more and more to fill the emptiness inside and we call this life.
"I am going" we say.
So we live everything behind, we become a monk. We pray all day, we fast until our body hurts, we beat ourselves up any time pleasure dares entering the mind. We become afraid of breathing freely, afraid of others, and we call this life.
"I am" we say when we have arrived.
The self is born alone and will die alone. In between birth and death, we can make our self believe that we belong to a group. We can join a religion, a family, a sports team, an ideology. We can believe in a nation or in a cause. We collect information, we hang out with gods and demons, we put postcards in a box.
All those colors and forms are the clothes dressing the infinite faces of the self.
"Atma Jnana" the wise men dance.
While we travel outside, it is inside that we explore. We meet our million faces, each a blood cell, a leaf on a tree, a flower petal.
The sad, the beautiful, the angry and the dreamer. Mam, dad, sister and brother.
They are all part of us.
The artist, the scientist, the farmer, the child, the idiot and the dying.
They are all part of us.
It is only by meeting other selves, that we start getting close to our real self. Under the never ending transformation, there seems to be a place where we can sit and be at peace. This self has been called by many names around the world. This self is pure creation, it has no end nor begining. It dances with life, free and without any safety net. It knows no past, nor future.
It knows nothing at all, because it is all.
Our real self is the journey. This self is life itself.
All the inner and outer travels point to this self. This self with no country, no book religion, this self with no place and no time, because it is everywhere, it is everything. This self that does not belong to anyone because it is part of every tree, every drop of water, every human being. This self is life itself.
This self is your own lotus flower.
When we meet this self, it is time to do the dishes.
"Know thyself" the wise men sing.
"I am" I say.
In October, my self and I went back to Kathmandu. Nepal celebrated Dasain, it's biggest hollyday. A few weeks later, the streets get lit up with lights and candles, it's Diwali. People dance, play music, eat meat, and more meat with one of the biggest animal sacrifice of the planet.
In November, we went back to France for a family matter. We said "hello, see you next time" to a Little Lutin. We visit Kronos in the hospital.
In December, we'll watch the streets turn red for coca cola santa and green for pine trees. The west celebrates Christmas by going into a shopping frenzy. We'll decorate a tree in the house for winter solstice, as the sun continues it's travels through the sky.
In January we'll be back on the road.
"Breath" the kids do.
They play with the suns setting and rising at the 4 corners of the world, with a tathagata lotus's smile on their lips.
"Breath" the kids do...and so should we all.
Lots of love to all of you from Manue
