Bodhisattva Seaweed . . . Or Maybe Not . . . Eh, Probably Not

My life is my message.

Mahatma Gandi

Bodhi means 'awakened' and sattva means 'a being.'  Together (Bodhisattva) they mean a person who is committed to awakening, a being committed to the freedom and well-being of every creature, who like a Buddha uses every circumstance to express the human capacity for understanding and compassion.  In widening our circle of practice, we discover the capacity of our heart to bear witness to the suffering of the world and experience our heart expanding, connecting in compassion to all life.  To live a life as a bodhisattva is not grand or idealistic.  It is simply bringing to every circumstance a spirit of love, openness, and freedom.

Jack Kornfield

A Shining Light or a Shining Path.  This is what I aspire to be.  No more darkness, doom and gloom, no more heavy sensations coming from me.  I can look at someone today, listen for a minute, and see a lightness or a darkness.  There's an aura that's readily apparent and readily accessible.  There are lots of combinations, of course, but it's not hard to differentiate heavy from light, positive from negative.  People I want to be around and people I don't.  People who energize me and people who suck the joy out of the minute. 

Hot Tub Guy was at the pool yesterday.  Hot Tub Guy is chatty and he won't leave me alone and he asks questions so it feels rude to ignore him.  If he'd just shut the fuck up I could soak my tired muscles for a few minutes but it's not happening so far.  I find that I'm tensed up while holding an  conversation that's inoffensive on the surface - as if I know a blow is coming but I don't know when -  because I know eventually he's going to say something confrontational designed to provoke a response, an argument.  Heavy.  Negative.  Eager to agitate and argue.  I canNOT imagine Hot Tub Guy has much peace in his life.  It's just too hard to be happy when you see threats and danger around every corner, certain that you're getting screwed out of your fair share.

My experience in life is that the quick burst of adrenalin and satisfaction that a victory in the arena of money, power, and sex provides is that the satisfaction tends to be fleeting.  This is why most of us have a lot of stuff that we don't need and don't use.  We crave the buzz, the hit, of acquiring a pleasant, glittering thing but it goes away a lot more quickly than the more durable things in life.