"The great courage is still to gaze as squarely at the light as at death." -Albert Camus.
I have a friend who is becoming quite materialistic. This is a quality that never just happens one day; it is something that develops, never through nature, always through nurture and through patterns of denial.
If she could only have that new pair of shoes. Maybe she cannot afford them, but if she just got them anyway, think of how much joy they would bring her. Isn't that worth it? The joy they would bring?
Could she not derive more joy by sitting under a tree? Does the tree not have more to give?
When we are unhappy with ourselves, our selves have an elaborate defense mechanism of shutting down lines of communication within. This thwarts our ability to receive joy from the infinite sources around. We cannot hear ourselves speak, and the true joys of the world can't get in. So we want. Because that need for joy doesn't go away- the spirit only starves while some limb of the self goes off looking for nourishment.
We want and we want and we want.
The very nature of wanting portends that it will always grow, externally, in proportion to how little communion occurs within the self. Wanting is a state of unfulfillment. Negative space.
I want to be completely, perfectly happy under a tree today. Looking at a duck. Taking a twig into my hand.
