Perhaps the reason we intoxicate ourselves with busyness so that we don’t have to face ourselves in the space of no-thingness. When we stop for a moment and look closely, we realize that our persona is based on an assemblage of things – job, friends, profession, political biases, nationality, cultural status, bank account, etc. What happens when all those are taken away from us and there is only quietude? That idea sounds scary to most of us. The subtle sound of the wind is not enough to keep us engrossed in life.
The real scary part is the fact that we don’t know the truth of us beyond all attributes. The being that we are left with when everything is gone is unrecognizable and unfamiliar to us, therefore we are scared. But we have to meet him one day whether we like it or not. It’s inevitable.
There is a story of a 59-year-old woman who had only a few weeks to live. A terminal illness had taken over her entire body. But she refused to die. When asked why? She said, “I can’t die now because I don’t know who I am. I have to find out who I am before I die. There is no way who I am is this disease-ridden body glued to bed in excruciating pain. There is something else here that I have managed to miss, something beyond all this pain and misery.”
She didn’t die as the doctors had predicted. She continued living. In fact, she became healthy and had the energy and focus to find out who she was. She eventually ended up dying after 3 years but she had found profound tranquility.
She knew.
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