(For Scott Kiloby, who brought clarity to openness.)
I want to thank the gods and magicians of the Internet for everything they do to carry these words about and abroad. I bow to Google, Microsoft, Time Warner, and South Carolina Electric and Gas Company, to name just a few. I bow to Wall Street and Washington. I bow to my teacher. I bow to you.
Imagine, there are thousands of computer engineers, cable and electric linemen, office receptionists, construction workers, sales people, deal makers, janitors and grocers, street cleaners and bank presidents and generals, literally millions of people whose efforts are required to bring us together in just this way. Right now! They have done their job. We are together. It is staggering. It is humbling. Now it is time for me to do my job.
I can tell that it’s my job, because it’s what’s right in front of my face to do.
I hope I can rise to the occasion.
These millions of people don't know they are helping someone named Fred. They don’t even know this Fredness exists. Neither do they know that they are helping you. On an active level, they don’t even care about us! Can you believe it? Here we are, the two very most important people in our whole world—which is currently an apparently shared digital dream called “Awakening Clarity”— and no one cares about us! I am the Writer of us all and you are the Reader of us all (until we’re not) and no one cares. Unbelievable.
Get this: they don’t even know about us! Imagine that. Yet they work for us! Wonderful! What a mystery.
Very few of these workers think of themselves as gods and magicians of the Internet. They do not think of themselves as servants of a Nondual Reality diligently attempting to bring clarity to the dark corners of the imaginary globe. They think they are sellers of pizza, makers of Subarus (or is that Subari?), and UPS deliverymen. Hah! Little do they know!
Insofar as they actively know, these citizens are just doing their jobs. Beyond the apparent motivation springing from their private fears and desires, which literally has zero to do with why they’re actually doing what they’re doing, they don’t have a clue. I don’t have a clue. But at least I know I don’t know; that’s a big step in the right direction.
I am the king of Don’t-Know-Land. Ring the bell! The king is opening up his coffers again! Still! Always!
I give away all my treasures daily, even hourly, at every possible opportunity. Take them, please! I give away my flawed and self-colored memories, my secret, special stories, my opinions, my hopes and fears. I toss out my dreams and disappointments, my cravings and desires, my shames, my pride, and my righteousness.
I am the king, but I am the poorest man in the land. That’s why I am the king. If you want my title, please, take it! I will give that away, too. Let me be the lowliest pauper of Don’t-Know-Land. Better yet, give me no title, no description at all. Let me live and die empty handed. Take what you will and leave me to die. Death is my constant companion; I need not fear him.
I have said all of that only to be more clearly understood when I said this: there is just one. Whether you know it or not, whether you care about it or not, none of that matters at all. There is still just one, and that oneness encompasses your doubt or disbelief. Or it encompasses your understanding of what is said here. It doesn’t care.
Given that there is just one, who do you think wins every argument in the end? There’s not a second, so it must be the one! Thus it does not fight. It accepts. It embraces everything just as it is. It is everything just as it is. Always and already it is here. It is typing. It is reading.
If there is just one, and there is something reading these words, what do you think that is? Where do you think that is? Who do you think that is? When do you think that is?
It’s time for me to take some books to the post office. I guess you bought them. I packed them already and now it’s my job to ship them to you. I don’t know why I do it.
------Note: When I say something like, “They don’t know why they’re doing what they’re doing,” this is completely true from the absolute position. Conversely, when someone declares, “I am doing this to pay my rent and feed my children,” that is completely true from the relative position. Both are true. Yet neither negates the other. It’s not even a real paradox, though it may certainly feel like one.
Most of the real confusion that I see and have experienced in spirituality, and especially in the vain attempt to “carry” our spirituality (which is over here, don’t you see?) over to our real lives (which are over there, plain as day) stems from confusion over this quite key, yet extremely slippery point.
We get it when we get, and we can’t get it until we do. Otherwise it would be too early. Namaste.
