Always the last to realise

This is the song that I would dance to if I had someone to dance with. It's almost like they wrote it for me. You know how that is with songs?

Underneath a Bodhi tree
That is where she brought me
That is where she bound me
Nobody found me

I became Dr Zen because I was lonely.

***

Do you know who you are? Do you know what you consist of? I work with the belief that I am actually somebody, and that ultimately I would discover, uncover, that somebody and be pleased with what I found.

I do the right thing as much as I can. I'm strongly moral and I feel good about being better than others who indulge themselves.

But then I look at myself and see nothing good about me. I see a liar, a cheat, a fool, a weak, insipid clown. And I'm afraid that if I peel away the accretions of this life that it seems someone has cloaked me in, I will find nothing at all, and doing the right thing was just a pointless, stupid way to ensure that I would drown in the shit that is the consequence of martyring yourself to not just getting what you need.

I became Dr Zen because I was afraid.

***

I know that deep within me there is that child whose heart was broken, and I love that child.
I know that in some corner of this vile man there is a beautiful soul that is crushed by it all, and I love that small light.
(I know that if I hold you in my arms, and we are far enough away from all this world, if that were possible, I know that you will see that I can be what you believe in, and I love you too.)

I became Dr Zen because I wanted to love myself, because no one else does, and truly, no one else ever will.

I know, sometimes a person thinks they do, but they have always only loved some thing that I can provide. And that is why I don't just provide those things. I could easily regain Mrs Zen's love, but it would be love for the act of being loveable. It's an easy path. But I want more than that, and I don't care how greedy it is to want it. I wanted more than the trinkets and easy pleasures and I've suffered for it and why should I settle for having failed?

I became Dr Zen so that I could write this post and not care what you think about it.

***

Can we start from tomorrow? Can we drop the cloaks we have been wearing and let ourselves take the risk that we are worthwhile? Can we rid ourselves of our monkeys, our bad selves, our nagging voices that tell us how bad it is to love to be free?

No, of course we can't. My only problem in this life is that I cannot bend the universe even slightly to my will. In so many ways it is not me, it's you. Everyone else seems to think that that is true about them. Which part of my education lacked that I can't?

I have been in a spin. Someone has made me feel. I had been doing very well at remaining numb until I got myself home. Someone has made me feel good though, and even if it is destined for tears, shouldn't we all feel good some of the time?

Did you ever have someone you wanted to touch? I don't necessarily mean you want to touch them with your fingers. I mean someone you wanted to feel your presence, so that you mattered? (And we are not talking about someone you wanted something from, not just some woman you wanted to sleep with you, or some guy who had something you wanted or needed even.) Did you ever have someone that if you touched them, you know, you would be real?

Do you know how it is to be a virtual particle, always in search of your antimatter, that special substance that will make you, however briefly, a spinning planet all of your own?

Does any of this make sense? It doesn't make sense even to me. I realise that at some point you have to stop caring what makes sense because that has made me crazy.

And I became Dr Zen because rage is alien to me. When I feel like I can let it go, you will never hear from me again.

posted by Dr Zen @ 1:30 pm