Simple Spirituality

 With my workload getting heavier even during these difficult days of the pandemic, I am finding it more difficult to maintain my regular routine of meditation, exercise, reading and writing, let alone meeting friends. But I see it as a blessing: to have one day's filled with activities that one love is better than boredom and aimlessness.

Throughout my entire working life, I've never given much thought towards building a 'career'. Obviously it is recklessness on my part but I've never really been comfortable in working just to build a professional reputation and to climb up the corporate ladder. It is a worthy pursuit for many talented individuals but I found out long ago that this wasn't my cup of tea.

 I see everything as an adventure--every job a task where one could learn and grow, after which one moves on to the next thing. I've never had an opportunity to be comfortable for too long in any single endeavour. Growth, in all aspects--physical, mental or spiritual--comes through undertakings that take the form of an adventurous quest.

In an adventure, one is never certain of an outcome. One has to face one's fears and be ready to improvise for survival. The only thing that one can trust is one's ability to learn. How quickly and effectively one does that, determines one's success in the adventure. 

Now, success is a dangerous word. It often implies social and physical rewards to the individual. But to me success means insight. At the end of the day, I always ask myself: what useful insights have I gained today.

By being insight-focused, one entire's existence is automatically spiritual. Spirituality is simple: it is just bare attention and bare honesty with oneself. Seeing everything clearly, understanding why there's pain in the world and then see through them by applying skillful means.

This simplicity (or one could even say, naivete) of this approach towards life is a sense of joy and discovery. And in the final analysis, it is all that matters.