Not Done, But Done

Q: I have been reading the dialogs that are posted on your website for the last couple of days. I am blown away by how easy it is for you to uproot the assumptions made by these particular inquirers. But the best thing about these exchanges is that they call to mind my own exact feelings and questions. Mine are in fact identical to those who seek your counsel. All the same questions that come up (and have come up for years and years) in my bullshit spiritual journey are being addressed to people that are seemingly made up of the same thoughts as me. This is very encouraging.

On the one hand, I want to say that I am terrified that the pointers you have provided for these people will not continue to make me feel good. Because what I typically do is read anything – your website, both Krishnamurtis, Tolle, Merton, Chodron, Watts, etc. – that makes me feel good, you know, to get a high out of it. Not unlike the way I have historically paid my respects to the bottle. No difference can I see between boozing, seeking, or exercising. Three ways in which I have tried to keep sane and failed. Part of me (and even saying “part of me” is indulging in the past, isn't it?) just wants to read about this stuff. That really can mess with a guy. When he realizes over and over that his “getting to the bottom of all this” is ultimately just a hobby.

But in the past couple of days it has really hit home that this running narrative is the ONLY problem. It just rears its ugly head in a million and one different ways. As you suggested, I am practicing cutting off the thoughts midpoint, both the thoughts that have the potential to make me feel uncomfortable/sad/angry and the ones that might make me feel better. And it is totally flipping me out how little of me really exists without this endless narration.

“It's OK to have this feeling. It's not OK to have that feeling.” Forever, I have been saying this to myself. Now, for the first time, I am given permission to be however the f*** I want to be, and nothing is really changed by this. No matter what spiritual practice or road I have driven down, it has never been addressed so plainly as you put it. Even if I say to myself, “Don't say that it is OK or not OK to have these feelings,” it's still a story. Thank you for publishing these dialogs.

Right now, as you always say, [there is no problem]...and when I start to feel like crap again, it won't do a damn bit of good to ask my brain/mind for any favors. This you have made abundantly clear.

A: What a charming letter. It appears you’ve taken my point, without me having to lead you through it step by step. That’s pretty amazing, in my experience.

Thank you so much for writing and sharing this with me. I hope it’s okay with you if I share it on my website. I think it will encourage other people to stop the bullshit seeking and see, like you did, “how little of me really exists without this endless narration.” That’s beautiful!

You’re welcome to write me anytime, if there is any doubting or whatever. But I don’t think there’s anything further I could tell you!

Q: There really is nothing that you have not addressed. So the subject line of my email (“Not Done, But Done”) is trying to communicate what it feels like in this early stage of falling out of the spiritual game, which is only a game for the mind to play over and over and over, ad infinitum.

I simply meant by those four words that the thoughts will keep coming – and oh boy did they today [Christmas] while hanging out with my parents for a few hours – but they simply cannot do anything but exist when left alone. Nothing is changed here where I am for them having visited.

There is no freedom or anything like that. Just the simple recognition of worthless chatter. To apply a label to this recognition would only be in service to a mind whose interest is often just wanting THINGS to BE some other way.

Thank you again. Of course it's cool to plop my letter up on the website. I couldn't be happier to share with you (or anyone else) how simple and how meaningful the words you have posted up there.

Best wishes and love back to you!