The Building of Boats….

Recently, while visiting with a long time friend she asked me to express my understanding of the difference between the New Age concept of “manifesting,” as discussed in sources like The Secret, and the kind of allowing and observance of what is unfolding, by which I choose to live my life.

It was a good question, and one that I wish I had a fluid and capable answer to.

I suppose is it comes down to the difference between Formlessness and Form. In the world of Form you can find an enormous array of teachers, modalities, traditions, pathways, and techniques to help you align yourself with your external goals and desires… and successfully so. There is nothing at all new about this.

In fact there is really, very little difference, between the notions to be found in The Secret, and the traditions and genuflections of the old religions designed to get you into heaven…only the location has changed.

The teachers of Form who populate the spiritual landscape seek to teach you how to get what you want. There is nothing wrong in that, provided you firmly understand that desire is a kind of sleight of hand, a mental misdirection that promotes seeking and searching, and by its very nature… disallows finding and having.

Form is the interplay of the things in the world around us, and the thoughts developing in the world within us….they come, live for a very brief span, and die away. That is a central and immutable feature in the world of Form, and as such, nothing that exists in that world can provide surcease to the restlessness of the egoic mind, and ease the burden that is inherent in being cast out of the Silent source. Like the prodigal son, only the return to source, will restore us to our rightful inheritance and to the formless bounty that was meant for us all the while.

Form is consciousness no longer aware of itself, and thus there is a subtle but very real type of bitterness embedded in everything that you can own, have, acquire, think about, touch, or achieve. So to “manifest” your desires will result, without exception, in some measure of an experience of being ultimately disappointed. If your desires manifest in a really large way, like with Elvis, or Curt Cobain, or Jim Morison, or Howard Hughes, etc. it might end up taking your life. But for the average human being, getting what you think you want will eventually make you merely tired, or sad, or disappointed, or confused, enough to inquire…”is this all there is?”… a most common response, to the discovery that getting what you want will not heal your internal experience of lack. Which is why, not getting what you want may well be preferable…at least with that, you can continue to dream and live in the fantasies of “someday”.

I have lost all interest in the teachings, and teachers of Form. Not that I count them as somehow without value, but rather, because I have fully integrated the awareness that the Forms of Life have no intrinsic importance due to the simple and undeniable fact, that they are entirely fragile. Thus what is manifested today will begin to crumble the moment it presents itself, dissolving even as it is being born…that is the nature of Form, the Buddha called it the impermanence of all things. Even thought forms can dissolve, as easily and as fluidly as they arrive, this is one of the great realizations of being able to stop your thoughts…you can clearly see that they have no reality, and are no more than a passing cloud, briefly obscuring an eternal and shining depth.

Formlessness, on the other hand, is consciousness aware of itself. It is the source of the mind, the heart, the world, and all that manifests. As source, it may be revealed, but can never be sought. It can never be found or grasped, as it is a priori, it is before all-else. The Bible describes it as, “And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the water.” Genesis 1:2.

Formlessness is prior to the “movement of Spirit”, prior to the manifestation of matter, prior to the process of creating, prior to development, prior to any and every form of success that can be imagined or created. Formlessness is the invisible source out of which all visible things are drawn.

Therefore Formlessness satisfies where Form cannot.

To touch the Formless center, even briefly, will change forever your understanding of what is valuable. Success has no relevance in the face of Formlessness, winning is a notion that deserves not even a wink and a nod, in the face of Formlessness… getting, having, owning, wanting, dreaming, manifesting, desiring, all empty vessels in the face of the eternal Formless presence.

I wish I were more poetic in nature, and in the voice I write with, as such, I might be more capable of illuminating the vast depth of Formlessness, the vast satisfaction that comes from its Silent and dark emptiness. It is, quite simply, our authentic home. The dark, quiet depths are not a source of anxiety…but one of bone deep relaxation. The weariness and worry of living in the world of constantly decaying Form can be laid down and sloughed off, in favor of the sweet, loving kindness of Formlessness.

Because I am not poetic enough to clearly translate the nuanced wonder of Formlessness, let me borrow from Antoine De Saint-Exupery… “If you want to build a ship, don't herd people together to collect wood and don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.”

Here in Saint-Exupery’s words is the difference between the teachings of Form and the teachings of Formlessness. The teachings of Form, or manifesting – will teach folk – the “how to” of it all, and a boat will be the result. Those teachers will make use of the Seven Habits of Highly Effective Folk, or the Four pathways to success, or the listening to your angels guidance to find your greatness, or any other type of step by step process by which you may build and manifest your dreams.

Is building a boat, a bad thing? Of course, not… It is not bad, or wrong, or upsetting any way what-so-ever, it merely is, and forever will be, ultimately unsatisfying.

If someone were to try to convince me that when they achieved whatever it is they thought they wanted, from plastic toys in childhood to vast and complicated achievements in adulthood, that it didn’t leave them wondering what was next, or how to get more, or why the shine eventually came off the apple…I simply would not believe them. Our entire society is built upon the unconscious truth that no-thing can really satisfy, our economy, our religious institutions, our cultural conditioning, our shared communal experience…all of it is, one great machine bent upon seeking and searching for something that can never be found, and thus the search continues and the wheels grind on.

So the building of boats is arguably a perceived necessary activity, and can cause some measure of trouble with respect to resource management, but only becomes truly problematic, when it is stripped from the sacred mystery and we lose the capacity to know it as merely an echo of a much deeper, and more abiding truth.

On the other hand, learning to lean into the “immensity of the sea”, is a thing that can go on for eternity, a thing that will fill up even the greatest sense of lack, a thing that can lift you above all seeming harm and into a consistent state of security and ease, despite your outer circumstances.

The immensity of the sea satisfies absolutely. Emotional hunger, spiritual thirst, constant craving, manic production, and whirling dervish activity, all resolve themselves in its vastness, its quiet depths.

For myself, I am standing on the very edge of the shore, near enough to know its wonder, but not immersed enough to keep the experience constant. At first that caused me sadness and a sense of loss, but now I understand that too, is beyond my control. I have lost all resistance to life, I rarely struggle, I do not seek, I am content, I am grateful beyond measuring…and if, like Moses, I am merely allowed to view the promised land, but not enter into it fully, that too, I am content with.

All of that, and more than can be described, comes out of the Silent, Dark, and Empty waters…before, Spirit moves. Formlessness gives rise to Form, and Form resolves back into Formlessness… this is the endless rhythm of Eternity. To turn one’s attention to the Formless is to restore sanity and to end the search and the struggle that comes from searching for more, or better, or different.

So I suppose I would answer my friend in this way…

…my attention is no longer on the gathering of wood, or the completion of tasks, or the building of ships – those things are necessary and I do them with commitment and care – but my attention, and thus my heart, are focused on the immensity of the sea and the beauty of its depths. I do not fear the formless emptiness, but rather find in it, the home I have earned with a lifetime of resolve.

This is the thing my Teacher taught me to focus my attention upon, and were I to be capable of gifting any single experience to all others that draw breath … it most certainly would be… that they encounter a one such as he, someone who can guide them above the Forms of life, to see clearly its Formless depths.

Once that has been touched, how and in what manner, the forms of life appear has little or no consequence.

I extend this offering to you in the hope that in it, somewhere resides… the echoing sounds of the ever moving depths, that the Formless life you were, prior to this body’s existence will touch you, teach you, love you…hold you.

Adayre R. Miller

11/15/11

photo courtesy of flickr photo sharing and Clint Barnes