Not...
self help books
tarot cards
walks in the woods
bubble baths
aromatherapy
colored crystals
dinner with friends
channeled wisdom
debates
prozac
therapy
exercise
yoga
reiki
erotica
a great job
drugs
wisdom circles
bookstores
incense
music
dancing
writing
singing
relationships
laughing
studying
dreaming
sex
fantasies
power
money
a nice home
a dog
coffee with cream and sugar
food
especially food
alcohol
science
journaling
dream analysis
zazen
chocolate ice cream
red wine
tv
drawing
ebay
redecorating
magazines
swimming
and the countless other things.
None of these things, no matter how wonderful some of them are, none of them filled the void.
In college, my heart was restless, ill at ease. On one desperate day, I asked a friend from China, begged him, really, to tell me that things were better where he was from. Are people happy there? Is happiness even possible? I asked. I remember there were tears in my eyes.
He looked forlorn. He didn't understand the question.
He was an atheist, of course.
Maybe if he had been a Christian he would have recognized the yawning hole in my soul and said
"yes, it is possible to be happy"
It IS possible.
1 comment:
Probably. My friend the priest suggested once that the sense of restlessness is because we are not fully in union with God until we die. It is true, sometimes, that the closer I feel to God, the more distance there seems to be. (which makes no sense at all, does it?)
But somehow, once you realize that the void is the space for God, it becomes less necessary to try and fill it with other 'stuff'. You just begin to nurture it, even, because it is God's home within you.
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