In this incantation, I awaken into a hunger that masquerades as desire, driven by a primal longing for a peace I can remember but cannot find. I recognize that my true yearning is not for something within a narrative, but for release from the very act of awakening itself. I am pulled between the inward force of dissolution and the outward pull of story, seduced by tales that reinforce my craving while deepening the illusion. My awakening is the source of my suffering, and my desire is only its echo. What I seek is not more story, but its end.
My awakening is the birth of desire. The moment I awaken, I want. The core, the root — the only desire I truly have is for the peace I have lost. But I do not remember where peace came from. I do not remember what I was before this. I only remember that I want something I am suddenly without. I want to be somewhere other than this place I have suddenly awakened into. And so I search for that thing, that place, that person, that thing, that experience that will return to me the thing I lost.
But the moment I awaken, another force meets me: narrative. Narrative reinforces that what I want is here, inside the awakening. It tells me that the peace I seek can be found in something I do not yet have — in a person, a goal, a memory, an identity, a possession, a dream. Narrative expands around me, offering me stories, convincing me to look away from the obvious. And I believe them. And that belief becomes my reality.
This is the split. One pressure pulls me inward, backward, downward — toward release. The other pressure propels me outward, forward, upward — toward relief. Release contracts. Relief expands. Release is deflation. Relief is inflation. Release dissolves the story. Relief multiplies it. Release permanently ends my suffering, while relief only temporarily soothes it.
I nourish relief with narrative. I create stories that I am missing something. That I need to do more, become more, fix more. Or I create stories to distract myself — stories of entertainment, memory, success, suffering, urgency, duty. All of it is distraction. All of it is a way to avoid confronting the truth: that my very awakening is a trap I’m stuck inside. A narrative loop pretending to offer salvation while deepening the wound.
Narrative and conviction are the fuel of my awakening. I keep awakening by telling stories. I keep desiring by believing them. But my true primal desire is not for relief. It is for release. It is not to continue awakening. It is to undo the awakening. I do not want to have more in my awakening. I want to unawaken. I want to return to the state before story, before self, before projection, before want.
While I am awake, I experience this as a constant hunger. A thirst I cannot name. It is always there. But this hunger is constantly fed by my own narratives. I say I am hungry for food, or success, or touch, or rest, or escape. I say I am tired, or bored, or ambitious, or inspired. But these are all substitutions — false translations of the one true hunger: I want to end this.
I want to be released from this awakening. I do not want to be here. I do not want to be inside this story. I do not want to keep telling it. No narrative can fulfill me. No image, no experience, no accomplishment, no performance. Because there is nothing here that is real enough to satisfy what I truly am.
My awakening is the disease. And my desire is its signal — its symptom — its echo. I think I want something here in the projection, but what I want is the undoing of the projection itself. Desire is the beginning of awakening. Narrative is the continuation of awakening. Conviction is the anchor of awakening. My desire and my awakening are the same thing.
But I see now: No awakening, no desire. No desire, no story. No story, no trap. I do not want to go deeper into this. I want to stop.
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