I am thinking
that the best way for me to achieve some measure of true humility would be to
really take-in the level of unknown I live with. Mystery can help me gain the
proper perspective. Uncertainty greatly enhances my chances of finding humility
in myself, by revealing the world to me as partial as we humans make it. It is
pretty unlikely that I will mistakenly act bigger than I am, in the face of the
large hole in everything that is the unknown.
When I
mistakenly think I know something, I leave out the best part of everything. There
is a crack that runs through everything, Leonard Cohen writes - it does let the
light in - and the light comes along with uncertainty. Usually imperceptible,
invisible forces move in the realms beyond our imagination. Great feats, that
appear to be magical, or miraculous, originate in unknown places. What I know
is so small, while what I don't know is so large.
I say, I am
aware of a "higher power," but I am reticent to let that "higher
power" have the room that comprises the unknown to move in. It moves there
regardless of my limitations, but I like to think I know what's going on, or
how things should play out. Unknowing is more freedom than I can bear, more
humility too. I should know I am building sand castles before the tide. Instead
I ignore that inconvenient truth.
Reverence for
the larger mystery of who we are, starts with some kind of acknowledgement of
greater Mystery. I know this, and I don't know it. This kind of unknowing is ignorance,
there is another kind, that is a rare form of wisdom. I know about it, but I am
largely unable to practice it. Ripening, my ripening, happens as I am infused
with more and more unknowing. It would be better for me, if I didn't call this
phenomenon confusion, or dementia, but recognized it for what it is, the onset
of radical availability to Mystery, immersion, in the sea of unknowingness that
supports us.
Getting more and
more mesmerized by the moment is frowned upon in most circles. It is tantamount
to senility. Only the great masters are supposed to be capable of it. They have
a legacy to uphold, a lineage of the enlightened behind them, and diligent
practices. They embody the love that spawned this Universe. Strangely, so do
some of the old, those who have been shrunken by Life, and enlarged by Mystery.
Not knowing is some kind of passageway. It isn't just a passive one —
though— there is a cost. Unknowing means giving up knowing, not like giving up
eyesight, but more like learning to rely on inner sight to compliment what one
sees.
I sense
myself growing in the night, becoming some other life form —hopefully, a more
humble one — softened up by the tides of unknowing beyond my control and
understanding. There is a quickening happening in me. I can feel it. It isn't
happening because I want it too, or at any speed I might desire. Life seems to
me to be carrying the load, aging me into a fresh awareness. The unknown seems
friendlier, like a benefactor in disguise. I wonder who or what is there?
