Incomplete

I have recognized but not entirely integrated into my thinking that accomplishing anything, any completion will not (cannot) provide gratification or catharsis. Like Sisyphus pushing his boulder up the same hill over and over again, we complete nothing and operate only on the delusion we do. After all, in order to go on, each morning Sisyphus must have awakened to a sense of duty, not just futility. There is a forgetfulness in our Sisyphean natures that allows us to carry on.

This, then, is the profound error: to believe even in the possibility of completion. Which is not to be confused with completeness, or wholeness. It could be argued (and has been) that everything is already complete in its current state and requires no improvement. But completion is an entirely different matter, assuming as it does a beginning in a state of disorder and a restoration to a permanent state of order. But the nature of all things in change, and the idea of that which has been completed as immutable is in defiance of the nature of things to change, therefore antithetical. We may reach the end of something, but never its completion.

Why does this matter? Because in my life the form suffering takes is this delusion that Getting Things Done is the point. Since I cannot truly complete a damn thing, I am perpetually frustrated (I suffer). The fact is, I will never have enough time or energy to do the things I wish to do or even those I feel I must do.Yes, I know, anyone can point to counterexamples to contradict this philosophy: I graduated from college, completed my daily walk, cooked an entire meal and was done with it, but it is at a more profound level that completion never happens. As we have learned, so we forget and must relearn; to have any benefit, the walk must be taken again tomorrow; we will eat again, today's meal will be forgotten. So it goes. Yet I continue to seek this form of control, an attempt to build my our Valhalla (and anyone who knows the operas knows how well that turned out!)

The abandonment of the striving for completion (the perpetual to-do list in my head) is motivated in me, though, not by futility but through an awareness that there is something more worthwhile pursuing. Now that I am sensitized to it, I see it all the time, both in myself and others, this desire to control, to eke out territory and the abject misery the inevitable failure to do so engenders. It seems to me that I see on most of the faces around me a perplexed bafflement, genuine surprise that the failed strategies of yesterday didn't work today, either. I spent the weekend around fellow spiritual seekers and my perception was that even there, at every turn this was true, except in the teacher, who has clearly abandoned striving.

This feels like unsafe territory. It calls into question the underpinnings of how I have lived my life up to now. How does the old pop song go? "The things you think are precious I can't understand." It calls into question, in fact, the underpinnings of our very social fabric. We want The Answer or, worse yet, believe we know it and strive to impose it on others. But it seems we have not been asking the right question, so the answer must be false. And if the question is, how can I be infinite? Or, what is the nature of love without limit? it becomes clear how meaningless an Answer can be.

But things are not hopeless; quite the opposite. The abandonment of the urge for completion could be the ultimate freedom. More next week.