Do You Really Live?

Evelyn says,

In hearing you speak I’m struck by your fabulous commitment to the idea of truly living. You speak passionately about it and I get lost in it, as it were. But is it possible to maintain this with any manner of consistency?

Hello, Ms. Evelyn. I believe it was last December, was it not? It has certainly been a while.

In any case, let me ask you a question.

Is it possible to maintain the way you live your life?

For how long will you maintain the cycle of happiness and disappointment? Is this enjoyable for you?

You have everything you could possibly want. You live on a private island, of all things. Every conceivable need is taken care of for you. And yet there is still a sort of hollowness, isn’t there?

Servants, private planes, money, and all manner of luxury does not satisfy the human mind. It constantly seeks more. Realizing this makes it easier to divorce ourselves from the mind.

When all the things that you have no longer belong to you . . .

When all the things you want no longer entice you . . .

When all the things you expect have no meaning to you . . .

You will have made a huge leap. You will feel very different from the way you feel now.

You will begin to taste life in its virgin form.

Evelyn, life can only be tasted in its natural state. It is not made or moulded. It is not manipulated or modified.

Feel it with the rising of each breath. And there it is.

Don’t adorn it or name it or direct it.

Simply experience it.

Experience what it feels like to be alive.

By alive I do not mean energetic and gleeful and animated and happy.

Simply alive.

A part of all living things.

Just for the time being. let this be enough.

Then contact me again, and tell me how it is going.

Say hello to “the dutchess” as you like to call her. And tell her to do the same.

I look forward to hearing back from you, Evelyn.