LIfe is the experience of a constant state of desire, the intention to end that desire, and the entanglements resulting. I awaken because I have not fully realized, internalized, and actualized my desire to end my desire. My realization that what I desire is the end of my desire is inevitable, but the path I take to realize and achieve that is variable.
Desire is the only true constant in my awakening. I may or may not experience change, but in waking I am certain to experience desire. How I express my desire determines the nature of my awakening experience (the “entanglements”). Broadly, there are two expressions of my desire: relief, and release. In relief, I seek transitory satisfaction of my desires, and in release, I seek the permanent cessation of my desire.
Pursuing relief or release is the path I choose back to Being. That I will return to Being is not in dispute, only the path I will follow is. The path of relief is the longest and most painful. But at some point, I begin to suspect something is deeply wrong with my existence. As I probe, I peel back the layers of self-deception that form my relief-oriented perspective to reveal an experiential truth: that I seek release. If I follow the experiential truth, I will find a shorter path to the end of my desire.
In seeking release, I become acutely aware of the vicissitudes of my desire. I understand that it is a fluid that effortlessly transforms into everything I experience in both my secondself and thirdself. Into bodily needs, sexual desires, hunger, thirst, aspiration, avarice, and the yearning for achievement and companionship. All of these things are made of desire like I imagine the physical world to be made of atoms. Desire is the true atomic structure of my existence.
In moments of calm and peace, my desire pools in the core of my being, controlled and viscous. But with excitement and titillation, it emanates inward and painfully hardens into the signature desires of my secondself: possessions, experiences, pleasure, knowledge, and achievement. These will not give me the release I seek and only create more pain and suffering. The shortest path to being is angling my desire toward release. To reorient toward release I must observe how my desire transforms from the peaceful fluid at my core into chaotic, lust-filled waters.
When I feel wanting, I must bring my desire back to my core. “I desire the end of my desire”, I repeat to myself until it returns to the source. To find the shortest path I must withdraw my desire from everything it has created before this moment. I must remember that what I desire is the end of my desire, and in achieving that, I will have everything I have ever wanted because I will be who I am.
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