When you realize how perfect everything is, you will tilt your head back and laugh at the sky.
~ Buddha
I've got this little two-year-old in my life.
No, this is not one of those posts about the little two-year-old me who lives inside of me; this little girl is real and in the flesh. Her name is Reya.
Ray-ahhh
When they're this small, they're little sponges soaking up everything you say and do and all the things you didn't realize you said and did (eep)! But although she learns a million things from me, I am always surprised at how much I learn from her.
Take this drawing of hers:
Yes, to the untrained eye it looks like pencil scratches, circles, and general two-year-old scribblies, but after she ran proudly and excitedly to me and said "Look!", I contemplated it for a minute and then asked her what it was. Without a moment's hesitation, she said,
"Buddha."
She knew exactly what it was. And when I looked again, I saw it too. Right there, in the middle of the scribbles and the lines and the circles, there He was. The Buddha. Staring straight back at me, wondering how I hadn't seen Him there in the first place.
I guess I wasn't really paying attention.
Buddha is said to have attained enlightenment and transcended this physical existence. So Buddha isn't something specific. He doesn't look a certain way. He is a concept. He is the idea that you can break free from this physical box and see the world differently if you choose to. He is transcendence, stillness, or whatever you make Him out to be.
With her drawing of the Buddha, Reya made me realize that even in the chaos, there is order, there is meaning. In her drawing there was nothing, and yet, there was everything. And she showed me that whatever enlightenment and perfection mean to you - that is what it is, and no one can argue with that. (Anyway, try arguing with a two-year-old!)
So I kept her scribble, and I will post it on my wall to remind me that it's all secretly perfect.
And every time I look at it, I will tilt my head back and laugh at the sky.
Can you find perfection in your chaos?
~ Buddha
I've got this little two-year-old in my life.
No, this is not one of those posts about the little two-year-old me who lives inside of me; this little girl is real and in the flesh. Her name is Reya.
Ray-ahhh
When they're this small, they're little sponges soaking up everything you say and do and all the things you didn't realize you said and did (eep)! But although she learns a million things from me, I am always surprised at how much I learn from her.
Take this drawing of hers:
Yes, to the untrained eye it looks like pencil scratches, circles, and general two-year-old scribblies, but after she ran proudly and excitedly to me and said "Look!", I contemplated it for a minute and then asked her what it was. Without a moment's hesitation, she said,
"Buddha."
She knew exactly what it was. And when I looked again, I saw it too. Right there, in the middle of the scribbles and the lines and the circles, there He was. The Buddha. Staring straight back at me, wondering how I hadn't seen Him there in the first place.
I guess I wasn't really paying attention.
Buddha is said to have attained enlightenment and transcended this physical existence. So Buddha isn't something specific. He doesn't look a certain way. He is a concept. He is the idea that you can break free from this physical box and see the world differently if you choose to. He is transcendence, stillness, or whatever you make Him out to be.
With her drawing of the Buddha, Reya made me realize that even in the chaos, there is order, there is meaning. In her drawing there was nothing, and yet, there was everything. And she showed me that whatever enlightenment and perfection mean to you - that is what it is, and no one can argue with that. (Anyway, try arguing with a two-year-old!)
So I kept her scribble, and I will post it on my wall to remind me that it's all secretly perfect.
And every time I look at it, I will tilt my head back and laugh at the sky.
Can you find perfection in your chaos?
No comments:
Post a Comment