“Seeking the Profound in the Ordinary”

Dan Millman, in his book, “The Peaceful Warrior,” states that there are no ordinary moments.  Each fragment of time and space is sufficient to itself and the expansion of the entire universe occurs as one dewdrop falls from a leaf.  Pretty weighty stuff and a concept that’s much easier to understand while sitting in a meditation garden with lutes playing in the background.  How many of us have the opportunity to retreat to a place of such ultimate contemplation, though, and for how long?  Sure, we can meditate for ten or twenty minutes a couple of times a day if we’re disciplined and lucky enough to grab the time, and that’s a great thing, but we must still exist in the ordinary world for more than twenty-three hours each day. No lutes, no garden. Each day we preform mundane tasks that on the surface appear to have little to do with enlightenment, but when viewed from another perspective, hold wonder.

What is the nature of the profound and why do so many of us

The culmination of the OSHO's Zen Tarot©
Major Arcana, #22, beyond illusion
deck by Deva Padma

seek it?  When you are immersed in a profound thought or occurrence your connection to spirit is so direct, so pure that you see past yourself and your particular reality.  You glimpse the core of spiritual oneness that links all existence.  Those glimpses are a promise that there is more than just us in the universe and that we are all interconnected. Kahili Gibran, in “The Prophet,” says that children “are life’s longing for itself.”  If that’s true, then as spiritual beings having a human experience, isn’t our quest for the miraculous and the profound simply our longing for our spiritual home?

Assuming we sleep seven hours a day, we have sixteen hours filled with school, work, commuting, chores, errands and common tasks.  With this tight of a schedule it only makes sense to seek the profound in the ordinary if you wish to live a conscious-filled life.  Think about the rhythm of mundane tasks; raking leaves, washing floors, folding laundry. Your body steps into a flow. Contemplate the way your muscles work together to move – how many unseen cells join harmoniously to accomplish a single movement.  You fold a towel in half, measuring the edges so they match up just so.  You fold it in half again and place it on a stack to be stored in the linen closet.  In this simple chore you learn continuance, how pieces of life stack together in natural order and that once something has served its purpose in life, it’s time to let go and move on.

There’s a world of enlightenment in the ordinary.  Today try seeking the profound in your everyday routine – be it work, or errands.  Be the moment and see what you discover.

LADY ORACLE    

OSHO Zen Tarot is available through my website!

Check out cool decks!