Thursday, August 2, 2012

seeking nothing at all


Robert Lax, Photo by Hartmut Geerken
sometimes i have conversations with an
imaginary guru, naturally one who lives
inside me.  he used to be a psychiatrist: at least
in the old days a lot of my conversations were
started with, & a lot of my problems heard
out or solved by, an imaginary Viennese who
listened carefully, often accusingly, & showed
me with a few apt technical phrases how far
i had erred in my thinking, or behaviour.
the Viennese fellow has disappeared; comes
back if ever for very short visits, but has been
replaced by chuang tzu (sometimes merton, or
sometimes chuang tzu in merton translation)
who tells me other wisdoms: usually the
wisdom of abstinence & avoidance; of retreat,
prayer & preparation, of non-attachment,
of “sitting quietly doing nothing”, of seeking
smallness, not greatness, of seeking nothing
at all.

Robert Lax, journal C p. 38

9 comments:

  1. How this speaks to me..

    Though the voices of my internal gurus are now those of Trappist abbots...

    ReplyDelete
  2. Beautifully expresses some of the lessons we all need to learn from "other wisdoms:" being is more important than doing; prayer and meditation is the best preparation for action; seeking nothing is the key to living a full life.

    Reminds me of this Zen saying:

    "Sitting quietly, doing nothing, Spring comes, and the grass grows, by itself."

    ~ Matt

    ReplyDelete
  3. alas --------

    so this !

    i was going to post a reply
    and
    started reading the all links
    when i got back
    i forget what it was

    blessings ----

    ReplyDelete
  4. stuff stuff

    i posted on monksworks.com
    and got this reply -----------------

    From: bobknab [mailto:knab@twlakes.net]
    Sent: Sunday, August 12, 2012 5:28 AM
    To: montaldo
    Subject: stuff

    greetings

    i red your blog stuff !

    it made me smile ------

    blessings________ boK

    -------------------------------------------------------

    That’s good.

    More to come on the Camino.

    Last blog might read:

    “This is Sally Bo Smith from Biloxi. We recovered Mr. Montaldo’s computer. I thought it best to tell all his friends that he is gone. We formed a search party for two weeks near where he was last seen walking into the Pyrenees. People who talked to him in St. Jean Pied de Pond thought he was nice. Ya’ll say some prayers, now.”

    Blessings ------------------------------------------------







    ReplyDelete