As I live my life, I find a deep existential fear within me. I call it existential, because I can't find a specific cause for it. I can't trace it back to its roots, but it reaches into my entire life. When I'm walking down the street, it creeps into my steps, whispering into my ear that I need to make sure my legs work right. I need to MAKE them move. And then I put unnecessary tension into my legs, becoming less efficient and putting the fear into my physical body. When I'm doing a yoga pose, it creeps in, saying that I shouldn't let myself go in that particular direction. When I'm dancing, the fear tells me that I'm about to miss the beat - it says to step now, before the music passes me by. The fear tells me I need to seek out a way to make a living, it tells me to worry about the amount in my bank account, it tells me to grab the closest thing and hold on for dear life.
And when I meditate, this fear abates, but a strange new feeling takes over. This is a certain aloofness from the world; it's a real sense that everything around me, including body and mind, is distinct from something inside me. It's as though I'm sitting on a bus, watching the world drift by, except that drifting is every sensible thing. In these moments, I intuitively sense that I am nothing but spirit, and this world truly is molded by the intent of that spirit. I feel that no action must be done, no heart won over, no dinner prepared, for all this is already finished as my spirit dictates. The world is something entirely new and strange, where I find that my actions ring hollow like the tantrums of a three-year-old. The fear sucks me away from this realization, and I am compelled to act. But these actions yield nothing. I end up dancing a dance of neuroticism, narcissism, nihilism. I end up denying everything I sense myself to be.
But I don't deny the existence of matter, and I don't mean to speak as though it doesn't matter. I think that once I can truly see from the perspective of spirit, I will understand the deep import of my actions. But without this understanding, believing that the true action is indeed the outer one, I feel that I doom myself to a wasted life. I really feel that I haven't done anything in my life - only meditation hints towards true action. I am reminded of the Marianne Williamson quote:
"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We are born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."
