I’ve been love struck. It’s, dare I say, rather awesomesauce! It’s a superhero kind of love. More on that later, but consequently, I’ve been deeply thinking about love.
How can we touch something that is untouchable? Perhaps it’s not the touching that is important, but it’s the reaching towards the untouchable. If we are able to touch that which is untouchable it ceases to have any meaning and it ceases to exist, at least on this plane. There’s a kind of love that feels like that. If we try to put it into words, it loses its grandeur. It loses its shape, even though there was really no shape at all. To put it in a box defies its existence.
Yet, we live in a world with boxes, shapes, and words. It’s how we understand the world around us. To be fully human is to be dancing with great fervor in this polarity of what can be touched and what cannot be touched. We can, however, feel deeply this sense of belonging and love that is so seemingly untouchable – something akin to home. It’s that piece of us mortals that some call the divine spark.
We are all on this trajectory to come closer and ever closer to this untouchable place. It’s not something we reach for outside of ourselves, it’s a journey through the desert within.
This divine spark isn’t something we attain. It’s already there. There are an infinite number of variables that can dim and even blow out the spark. To catch the divine spark in all it’s grace and glory is to look in the eyes of a child that has been deeply loved. There we shall feel a deep sense of that which cannot be named or spoken. Perhaps even in the eyes of a lover or a friend we may find a magical memory stirred of the purity in which we once before saw the world through the heart and eyes of our youth.
Love is a filterless sight to be seen at a glimpse and to be felt with great magnificence. Yet, somehow, given all the magical love in the air, there’s a whole lot of work that goes into this seemingly pure experience. Love and discipline together create quite the alchemical mix.
It’s in this state that Organic Zen takes place.
Organic Zen was the phrase that resonated with me at a recent Dharma Talk at the Houston Zen Center. There are no additives in organic Zen, nor are there any filters. There’s an element of youth to it. Organic Zen is the face of a child and in the face (and spirit) of a child there’s an element of spontaneity.
Organic Zen, energetically speaking, is reconnecting to our free play youth years. In our free play youth years, creative surprises are the norm. The intriguing thing about spontaneity is that we can’t learn it and we can’t practice it, but we do have to be open to it.
So, back to this thing called discipline. There’s a certain discipline that helps us access this free flying freedom state.
I suppose that’s where I will return to this superhero kind of love that I mentioned earlier. A superhero is a champion or a crusader. Superheroes fight the good fight. Even though superheroes have incredible mental and physical capabilities, they still have to do the work to fight the good fight! There’s a discipline and a type of magic that occurs in their jobs to unite humanity.
Superheroes have to walk the internal desert alone.
They have to do the work to access and welcome a state of Organic Zen. And, it is in this state that spontaneity has the opportunity to come alive. With spontaneity comes creative power and authentic joy and somehow leads us along the path to the kind of home that can’t be touched.
I have immense hope that our world will embody the superhero kind of love and for that to happen, it starts with us. We are all on his trajectory of growing and evolving. As a committed optimist I was really struck by the recent poignant comments musician, Zoe Keating, made at her Houston performance while discussing her song called Optimist. She noted that optimism doesn’t just happen, but we have to work for what we want to happen. Again, there’s a discipline we must commit to before the state of Organic Zen can truly arise.
So, what are you waiting for?! Put on your cape, grab your lasso, and your shield and tap into the superhero kind of love. Have hope, but don’t forget to do the work.
“It is not our job to seek for love, but to seek for all the barriers we hold against its coming.” ~ A Course In Miracles
Om Shanti Om ~ Athea
