Here, A Love Song ( A Nessaiver)

10. …here, a love song (A children’s book for adults) Written and illustrated by Jean – Pierre Weill 3506 Bancroft Road; Baltimore, MD 21215 tel. no. 443.691.3098 January 12, 2010

Contents EPIGRAPH: Rene Magritte Preface : An idea is proposed. The purpose of creation was to bestow a gift, to which we’re awakening. ...................... i – ix Part I: The narrator encounters the reader at a train station, and invites him on a journey. .............................. 1 – 18 Part II: The narrator makes the suggestion that well-being is inherent in all things and accessible to them. ................. .. .. 19 – 45 Part III: Wherein the narrator illustrates, with examples, the experience of well-being. ................................. 46 – 76 Part IV: Wherein the narrator explains, with an example, how estrangement from our inherent well-being takes place. .......... 77 – 93 Part V: We commonly pursue well-being by trying to control our circumstances, our outer environment. .................... 94 – 121 Part VI: Experiences are generated not by outer circumstances, but from the inside. .................................. 122 – 146 Part VII: Witnessing our thinking patterns, we release control of circumstances, and enter into relationship with them. ........ 147 – 172 Afterword: A three verse illustrated poem in rhyme which recaps the preceding, and returns the reader to the preface. ........ 173 - 188

i. In the beginning, before anything was created, there was nothing.

iii. There arose within the Oneness, a desire, so to speak, to bestow a gift. So it chose to give itself, since it alone was real.

iv. Thus, a space in the nothing was surrendered, and…

v. BANG! The universe was created. An event not very easy to illustrate.

vi. Within the new universe each creation was given the gift of oneness.

vii. Then each joined into complex, more integrated wholes.

viii. Atoms merged into molecules, which formed into cells, and so on,

ix. until the most novel and distinctive beings emerged. Yet none had awakened to the gift they had received.

3. These words will be our propeller, these images our fuel.

6. With nothing to lose, wouldn’t we always choose to go there?

7. Yet, finding our way seems so improbable, so naïve.

8. Confident that we are fellow travelers, I hope not to leave you stranded, number 9 just ahead, left unread.

9. One thing I ask of you: Bring attention to your thoughts, those that take you from this book, this page - quiet them, and come back to

11. And value this attention, this listening, as if

12. it were a mysterious gift, yours for the taking.

12. We’ll then be less likely to lose each other among interfering lines of thought.

14. The way forward, I’m suggesting, is simple. Perhaps it’s so close, so obvious, we don’t see it, like water must be to fish.

15. We’ll state principles without clutter or ornament.

17. Shall we go then, you and I, with the evening spread before us?

18. We string a first thought, an article of faith. This:

21. beneath whatever we imagine to be wrong with ourselves,

22. there exists something which is inherent in everything.

23. In movements dramatic or small, we steer ourselves closer, sometimes farther from it.

24. What sustains everything. We may call it well-being .

25. Among us there are illustrious voices of great integrity who suggest that this is not so. Well-being, they charge, is not at our source.

26. At the crux of things, they reason, everything is random. In their hands,

27. freedom is reduced to necessity,

28. and life is reduced to matter.

29. Theirs, however, is not our path, heroic though it may be. Ours is

30. one in which the world is not accident,

33. a world created from nothing, a world within which there is nothing that comes from nothing.

34. From a lifeless hat, life peeked out,

35. and from life, awareness.

36. We can entrust ourselves to this mystery, for we are part of it. Indeed, we are its leading edge.

38. Although we know there is much work to do,

39. and tracks can lead into excruciating darkness,

40. and into deepest instability,

41. where a person can tumble from the sky on a clear September morning,

42. is the world not whole? Is it not beautiful?

43. Perhaps well-being is not like some lost treasure with no map or pathway to it.

45. Perhaps it’s just now available, a choice, something you try on and wear.

46. What notes resonate when we come nearer to well-being?

47. We incline toward joy without special occasion.

48. We tend to appreciate the marginal and fleeting things scattered everywhere,

49. and everything seems abundant, more than the strictly necessary.

50. We appreciate others and are happy to show it.

51. We appreciate the symphony.

52. We’re at home in the world.

57. When we move away from wellbeing, joy becomes dependent on special occasions.

ii. Only Oneness. 59. Uncreative.

60. Life appears to not allow for many choices.

62. rail against higher powers,

63. and weave epics about past glor ies or failures, or failures and glories to co me.

64. We set impossible expectations for ourselves on the one hand, and on the other…

64. we’re full of self-recriminations. And as for other pe ople ,

67. Nothing’s ever quite right.

68. No longer at home in the world, we view the world as a battleground. Indeed, the battle may be most ferocious in our own home.

69. We have a feeling of unease whose origins cannot be identified and therefore cannot be pacified….

70. Apathy and victimhood mask a dread of mediocrity.

71. And everything’s a struggle.

73. In short, we navigate a thin wire of fear,

74. and wander from well-being into fields of pressing discontent. We wander for minutes or days or weeks.

76. For decades? If well-being is so inherent, how is it that we spend so much time exiled from it?

78. when we were infants in the garden, with no thought to be anything other than ourselves,

79. And everything was simply what it was, in the sanctuary of the One,

80. And there was neither right or wrong nor good or bad.

81. And whatever we made were masterpieces of beauty.

82. Oh, how we loved to feel our feelings.

83. Then one day, that child that was us passed by a wall – a wall he had passed countless times before – and was captivated by its vastness.

84. A picture would be splendid here.

85. Five trees, four birds, three stars, two deer, one moon…

86. Then… Oh, ecstasy! Footsteps on the staircase!

87. In a moment he’d leap from behind the bed and be borne on waves of adoration, joy, and …

88. But, alas, he discovered that things could go wrong,

89. that he could be wrong, isolated from the oneness.

90. There was, he discovered, imperfection in himself or in the world.

91. Consequently, in a place where he would not be seen or heard, he studied how to prepare his face,

92. so that he might return home.

94. If well-being is always available, why then does it seem so difficult to attain?

96. Let’s say the train is delayed,

97. and she’s waiting somewhere.

98. She’s thinking, Oh, where is he?

99. Or you’ll miss something important

100. and you just know there’ll be consequences.

101. You’ll then feel you’re without any resources.

102. If only you could compel the train to come on time and thereby solve the issue , you’d be …

103. well, then you’d be happy. But you can’t make the train be on time.

104. Should something come out of the clear blue sky to improve matters …

105. well, then you’re happy again.

106. The issue would be solved.

107. One instant we’re sailing along,

108. Next thing we know, someone cuts us off and tells us concisely to be fruitful and multiply. We might wave back with less than five fingers.

109. How swiftly that cheerful spirit slipped into a strong desire to teach that cowboy a lesson.

110. Up and down, round and round.

111. Let’s take a closer look at the factual world of recordable and measurable events.

113. Let’s say we’re traveling somewhere. We’re enjoying our circumstances – all the beauty beyond the ads.

114. Suddenly, the car breaks down. It’s a flat tire, a failed engine. No wrench, no time, no help, no clue, no luck.

115. After all, if our tire hadn’t punctured (a circumstance)

116. or if that someone wasn’t waiting for you (another circumstance)

117. or if, perhaps, you weren’t expected somewhere (another circumstance)…

118. If only the issue were solved, you’d have well-being. Yes?

120. Let us thread a second bead,

121. and stand the matter on its head.

122. Our experiences are generated, not from circumstance, not from the outside, but from the inside.

124. It’s your relationship with, for example, a set-back.

125. It’s what you’re thinking when, for example, someone cuts you off

126. or when you’re late, in which people are waiting.

127. We organize our circumstances into stories,

128. interior maps, and travel their familiar roads.

134. We see ourselves sometimes one way,

137. by stories of a life we think we should be living,

138. we cut ourselves off from the one we are living,

139. and mortgage the present moment for a future one that isn’t here.

143. Encountering our stories again and again,

145. and keep writing our stories

146. and keep painting our maps.

147. Those maps. Repetitive lines of inner argument…

148. sly palindromes, unsolicited and insolent,

149. echoing from farther rooms,

152. that the issue had not been, had never been, the issue…

153. but rather, how you had been with the issue (that was the issue!) –

155. to a new perspective. You see that the face of your misery

156. had only been you looking back through the stories with which you had defined the world;

157. and your difficult feelings had only been your body’s natural responses to those narratives .

159. you can laugh, you can bless yourself,

160. When you’re here, you already have whatever you seek.

161. You’re not waiting anymore.

162. For at the origin of our narratives, what’s there?

i. Striding between two nothings,

v. And the well in front of our nose

vi. When we board the train of circumstance

vii. Its passenger, its engineer

x. Soothes the child’s fear.

xi. Our histories , those mysteries

xii. While they don’t repeat, they rhyme

Here, A Love Song ( A Nessaiver)

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