Early this month I camped in the Sonoran Desert, Arizona. The air was dry and warm. I thought that it was just beautiful and perfect. This past weekend I camped in the Virginia Forests. The air was cold and wet. I thought that this too was beautiful and perfect. Of course, I understand that as different as these two places were and as beautiful as I thought them to be, that neither of these locations were perfect. Neither were the experiences that I associated with them.
While I hold a preference to the warm temperatures, sunny days and clear nights, I understand that it is a preference. I enjoy this preference in part because it seems to exist for me at the moment. This appearance is possible to me because of the non existence of cold temperatures, cloudy days and snowy nights. Both can not exist, or appear to exist, at the same time. This is the nature of duality. I am able to compare one against the other, see the contrast, judge the merits of each, and formulate an opinion about which one of the two is more pleasing to me. This is the nature of preference.
On the surface, this action of thought would be accepted by most as being quite normal. We all do it all of the time. We make choices many times a day, selecting one thing over another based on how it makes us feel and what we would want more of. Our preference with regards to what we want drives us to make decisions about many things, such as what we purchase, what we want to do for a living, etc. Advertisers and Marketers know a whole lot about how this works. They use this their knowledge about this little facet of human behavior to their advantage, charging their clients big bucks to promote and sell products and services. This nature of want is powerful, but it is also very dangerous.
The nature of duality, the nature of preference and the nature of want are all false. None of these phenomenon have anything to do with what we need, and have nothing to do with what is ultimately true. What we want and we need here on earth are very different and which one we choose to place our concentration upon cultivates the path that we travel through in this life while we are in this world.
In the hot desert sun we may need some shade, darkness, water. In the frigid forest with snow poring down we may need shelter, fire, food. The more extreme the situation, the more our mind focuses on need instead of want. When we become cold we may want to be warm, then the moment becomes we need to get warm. This is the point when we choose need over want. We also call this survival instinct. There are many in this world that are never presented with the opportunity to shift their focus in this manner. Let’s face it. If your basic needs are taken care of and then some, you are comfortable and live without the treat of becoming harmed from the Earth’s elements, then you are pretty likely not going to pay much attention to what it is you need. Instead, your mind becomes a residence for thoughts about what you want. I can almost promise you that the man building a shelter and hunting for food in the hours before darkness on snow covered terrain is not thinking about how nice a Ferrari would look in his driveway. Nor would he give any thought to what others would think about it.
For most of us, we live in a day and age where extreme survival skills are not necessary. We generally have it pretty good in that our basic needs can be met relatively easily. We are comfortable. This state of being opens the door for us to place our focus on what we want. I understand this and do it myself from time to time. I also understand that in my search for ultimate wisdom that this is not the most beneficial use of my time. The most wonderful thing about this world is not the fantastic places that are fun to visit and photograph, it is the power educational resource that it represents. Every day that we are here is an educational opportunity.
This life that we lead is a learning experience. It is as simple as that. In this dualistic world yes, there is love and hate, white and black, hot and cold, so on and so on. It is this way, nothing more and nothing less. In being so, perhaps so much more can come from so much less. Perhaps the extreme cold can assist us with refocusing our mind on what we need rather than what we want. Extreme contrasts such as sleeping in the desert and then sleeping in a freezing forest help us to pay attention to exactly what it is that is around us. To live in it first hand without the comforts that we have created for ourselves through our wants and desires, we enter the realm of less. We all can pay close attention while in Earth School and learn from the experience. We just need to take the opportunity. Such as during the cold Winter months, we can choose to drop the weight of our possessions, if even for a small length of time, get out of our warm houses and into the elements. When we do so, we can then face the cold, accept it and find peace in what is the moment. We can enjoy the opportunity to shift our focus away from want and possibly find a new understanding about the difference between the two. With much practice we can learn that from an enlightened mind flows the warmth of Truth.
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