Tidepools and Wildflowers

I’m reading an interesting book by David Brazier, Zen Therapy: Transcending the Sorrows of the Human Mind. This title quote is in reference to the process of becoming a bodhisattva, but I took it as a straightforward suggestion to go hit the trail. Later, I resumed reading, and Brazier goes on to say, “In another text, Dogen says, ‘Travelling is hindered by arrival.’ Bodhi is not a matter of having got somewhere but of being in process, in the flow. A person who has reached the point in Buddhist understanding beyond which progress becomes irreversible is called a ‘stream enterer’” (p. 181).
Don’t you love the idea of getting to a point, with just about anything, where “progress becomes irreversible”? And also, once you’ve arrived, you’re no longer on the path, and I like the idea that it’s all about the journey.
I have major recurring depressive disorder. It’s one flavor of clinical depression, and for me, the worst part of it is the word “recurring”- I’ve had a few extremely bleak periods, and I’ve been lucky to find help via great therapists, useful resources, and in some cases, that included medication. I’ve been doing well, depression-wise, for the past couple of years, and I work extremely hard to keep it that way. I’ve found exercise and time outdoors are two of the things that are foundational for me in keeping the depression at bay. So reading the sentence “The wisest thing is to be on the path” was a great reminder, even though that isn’t what he was talking about- I’ll take my wisdom and inspiration wherever I can find it.
It also made me think of Led Zeppelin: “Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run, there’s still time to change the road you’re on.” I think there are so many more than two paths you can take, but I’ve been very thankful to find that there’s time to change the road I’m on.
I hope your paths lead you to beautiful vistas, and that if you should find yourself on a not-so-great path, you’re able to muster the courage, strength, and energy to change it. Easier said than done, I realize, but I believe it’s possible, for all of us.
Edward Abbey said it better than I ever could:
“Benedicto: May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds. May your rivers flow without end, meandering through pastoral valleys tinkling with bells, past temples and castles and poets towers into a dark primeval forest where tigers belch and monkeys howl, through miasmal and mysterious swamps and down into a desert of red rock, blue mesas, domes and pinnacles and grottos of endless stone, and down again into a deep vast ancient unknown chasm where bars of sunlight blaze on profiled cliffs, where deer walk across the white sand beaches, where storms come and go as lightning clangs upon the high crags, where something strange and more beautiful and more full of wonder than your deepest dreams waits for you — beyond that next turning of the canyon walls.” -Edward Abbey