The Urge to Run

The homeless man with no legs crawls on his dolly like a snail while the world keeps whizzing by. No one wants to lose their legs, to go that slow. But sometimes, we’re forced to stop in order to empty ourselves of everything that’s in the way. Love can stop us in our tracks just as swiftly as suffering. It’s up to us to choose love before suffering takes our legs out from under us. In truth, every time I thought I was going somewhere, I began to speed up, and then began to feel behind, then lost, and then I felt a failure of sorts. Until I was loved or broken in place. And being rid of all I imagined and wanted, I rediscovered the wonder of just being here. This seems a cycle of human seasons—from want, to hurry, to feeling urgent and behind, to feeling lost and then a failure, to being stopped in our tracks, so we can rediscover the bareness of being. Now, my want is to accept this endless practice, which we call being human. We keep going, though there is nowhere to go. We keeping wanting, though there is nothing to own. We keep breaking, so that love like light can flood every break. I drop some coins in the legless man’s cup, hoping that you will drop a pebble of light in my mouth, when I have lost the urge to run.

A Question to Walk With: Describe your urge to run and your urge to stop. Which has your attention these days?

This excerpt is from my book in progress, The Signature of Being.

  AUG 26-28: Mercy By the Sea, 167 Neck Rd, Madison CT, weekend workshop, Reclaiming Our Humanity: Being Fierce and Tender in Our Call to Love, Fri 7-9:30PM EST Sat 9:30-5:30PM EST, Sun 9:30-1230PM, (web link) — IN PERSON