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| Looking for a diversion, an emotional distraction, a personal relationship to fill the void on Paris' "Bridge of Love Locks" over the Seine ("sane"), a popular tourist attraction (kunm.org) |
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| Oops! - Captain Chaos, you've done it again! |
Our teacher Bhikkhu Bodhi once wrote in "The Quest for Meaning" that, just as Nature does not tolerate a vacuum, humans will not tolerate a loss of meaning.
Then to escape the plunge into an abyss of meaninglessness, we grab for anything to immerse ourselves in distractions.
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| Answer to all my problems: Jeremy! |
What do we do? Bhikkhu Bodhi says, We pursue pleasure and power, seek wealth and status, surround ourselves with contraptions, invest our hopes in personal relationships to conceal our inner poverty.
We use our absorption in whatever distractions we can find to help us cope with our psychological VOID. But then this stifles a deeper, more insistent need -- our longing for freedom and peace that does not depend upon anything external.
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| What if I were to love myself? No! |
We don't need a religion, a relationship, or a Revolver (like the Beatles who claimed "happiness is a warm gun"). But we need something!
Maybe "thing" is not the right word for what we need. If we had accomplishments, we'd feel better. We may not need them, but they wouldn't hurt. Maybe we need capabilities. We may not need them (or we may already have them uncovered and untapped), but they wouldn't hurt.
Breaking up is sad not because who we were with was so great, but because we know we're never going to be able to get someone this good again. At least that's what we think in our loss. Maybe what we need is to become Pick Up Artists (PUA) with style, a little substance, and a lot of sex -- but not all crazy like Method or that killer.
No, I think LOVE would work, somebody else's love. I have nothing higher to live for! Just like this video, which tells the story of a passionate relationship backwards and forwards:
Our Relationship in Forward
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| Vesak 2014 with Bhikkhu Bodhi at Bodhi Monastery, New Jersey (bodhimonastery.org) |
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