Walking down to town the other day, in good weather, I could not help but lose myself in the simple beauty of nature. I playfully wondered along, reaching out to sapling leaves, caressing silky flower buds, and marvelling at the dance of insects returning from wintery sleep.
And for a moment I saw myself from the outside, and I reflected at being in a place where I hated witnessing the kind of behaviour I was engaging in… where I would judge this as ignorant, idle naivety, and to take joy in such simple beauty was obviously… stupid… for some reason… and if you knew the truth you should be miserable! Why was it like this in the past?
The way I see it now, is that something arrogant, perhaps a type of ego, dismisses simple, obvious and effective solutions out of a false sense of self importance and self complexity:
“How could such a simple solution work for me! I and my woes are much more complex than that, and therefore require a complex solution (possibly involving manmade medical horrors beyond comprehension).”
Why is simple scary to this ego?
Because the truth of simplicity knocks it right off of its high horse, and brings it back down to earth. The simplicity of nature reminds us that perhaps we are not so different, not that impossible, and perhaps not that important after all… and simple, timeless remedy and wisdom is applicable. That we are timeless - in that we have time. We have the time to ‘do nothing’. We don’t have to have anything to show at the end of the play, and perhaps its better if we didn’t have that baggage anyway.
The fear that our problem can be solved, and moreso by relatively simple means is paradoxical… but sometimes success is more scary than failure. We can learn to get comfortable, even love our problems. They can be a shield to block something else positive, yet even more scary to our ridged ego and belief structures coming into our lives.
More and more I consider it, reflect on it and live by it, the more clear it becomes - simple.
So simple it just makes you laugh when you realise it. It’s as simple as saying, everything is ok, I will endure, and it will all work out in the end. And this outright infuriates some folks… as it did to me in the past. Seeing this progression makes it all the more pleasurable to be simple.
Cheers.