The Middle Way… a dialogue

Seeking the answers yet to questions unknown, our Pilgrim sits by the Eternal Flame in Arlington on one cold winter’s night with his friend Elder. And while others are fast asleep from the day’s activities’ this night has only just begun… a night of wonder, inspiration, and enlightenment under the constellation Virgo… JC

Pilgrim: I  feel the silence in this moment, a silence so deep it thunders in my head, I ask of you, my friend where is my mask, my armor with shield and sword held against this cold world? The armor I polished every day complete with accolades to its mesh, the shield which hid me from all the undesirable thoughts and situations, the compassion I could have felt but choose not to, the sword that cut away anything that ruined my view of my world. So was the shield hiding me from the world or from myself? Was my armor there to facilitate my way in the world or detain me from my true path?

Elder: The mask, the armor, the sword, never existed, they were a product of your mind used to promote a life of extremes but in reality, they were ineffective as armor is constraining , clumsy and indifferent for it hides you from yourself as well as others.

To be numb to the inner realm is to live exclusively in the temporal world in which one is either great or mediocre. To be numb to the temporal world is to live exclusively in the inner realm in which one is either psychotic or virtuous. To be numb to both worlds is to exist as Merlin after the Lady of the Lake seduces him and locks him in a sacred tree.

Pilgrim: Is there a middle way, a center that allows the smallest and biggest, the pain and joy; a path for all opposites to reconcile with one foot in the universe and the other in the field of time, a time/space continuum? A way to conquer this seeming lack of feeling; to send this depressed ineffectiveness to Charon the ferryman across the River Styx, coins in hand?

Elder: The Buddha emphasized a life of no extremes, the middle way and he would know for his life was of extremes. Growing up in the lavish facade of his father’s house to his years of extreme asceticism almost starving to death trying to find the key to overcoming pain and sorrow.

Until one day he saw a boat navigating the center of the river, not the left or the right but the center. And this vibration changed his life.

So my friend be as the Buddha, change your vibration, change your life and go the middle way of no extremes. Such is the path to peace, in both kingdoms of being.

©jc2012-9