The joyful activity of the life of meditation cannot be taken away by anything. Whatever comes, pleasurable or painful, is liberated when freed from the tight grip of a self concerned with itself. The open way of what is good to do can always be found.
This joy is not whimsical or reckless, within its sympathetic softness is strength and a capacity for responsible behaviour. Obviously (perhaps), this subtle joy has nothing to do with feeling any particular way or our situation. Joyful activity pierces even the darkest seeming, most intractable grief and fear, illuminating their buddhanature in acceptance.
One of the significant aspects of buddhadharma is that only in awakening are causes and conditions accepted. With misunderstanding comes the resisting and chasing of causes and conditions. This is where problems of restriction lie, not in causes and conditions. The rightful place and utter freedom of all that is occurring, is in its baselessness. Having no location, everything manifests without ever impacting on a person.
A confused mind may wish to know why things seem to be as they are and then try to negotiate through life by manufacturing strategies of avoidance and control. Such behaviour misses the truth of causes and conditions as it is not hidden behind anything. Even when this doesn’t seem clear it is so, how could it not be? It takes active trust to be open to this and to penetrate the detailed appearances of how things seem to be.
Anger, judgementalism, cynicism, despair, stubbornness, laziness, resentful neediness – the many forms of hardness and indifference are signs of ignorance at work. If these signs are not faced, ignorance causes ruin, making an immaculate body-mind miserable. Ruin is unfortunate and it teaches too, it is not a substantial dead end. It is always possible to turn around and look. Better to look quick and sharp than to drift at the mercy of currents of unease. Ignorance too has no fixed basis, we shouldn’t grant it power that it doesn’t have.
Gratitude and generosity of spirit are just two of the many signs of enlightenment. We are advised by teachers not to try and measure these or any such signs in ourselves or in others. How could we even begin to try? There can be no room for a watcher when gratitude and generosity come from a seamless connection with all.
Inexhaustible pathways in a trackless and open land, gratitude and generosity seek no reward in their manifesting. This does not mean that it is always easy, it does mean that there can be ease even when the demand seems great.
All that is asked for (but not forced), is that we give ourselves deeply. Then the dharma of existence takes the weight, making clear the unhindered joyful activity of existence. Life and death are not opposites, there is nothing that can be really lost. While we don’t give up self obsession, the basic unstained nature of blood, bones and mind is mistrusted and unrestricted activity is denied.