Becoming

It occurred to me last night, whilst meditating through insomnia, that becoming – our most active and vital of words – is the same as entering. When the teacher says something like, “Put your mind in the dan-tien,” what does it actually mean? It means that you make the dan-tien the centre of your reality and you allow yourself to become imbued with the mood of the dan-tien: you become the dan-tien. To become the dan-tien you must enter it, which means leaving the space you usually inhabit. Students always fail to appreciate just how total this leaving must be so we have a special word for it – abandonment. In a way it is the same as knowing you have no choice, or single-weightedness – knowing that you cannot effectively be in two places at once and that to do anything justice requires total commitment. Abandonment is an act of spirit – it comes from spirit and it thoroughly nourishes the spirit. To become you must first abandon and then enter. Becoming involves not just changing places but changing everything – shape, the way you behave, the way you think, the way you are. It is the act that conjures the between-energy – the spirit or life between. The most powerful becoming experience I have ever had was when my son (now 13) was born. In that moment I became a different person and I could clearly feel it happen. Suddenly the world was different. I was no longer the most important person in it. There was now a creature for whom I would, without a second thought, lay down my life. This wasn't nobility from me, it was natural, and it is a wonderful and probably the only measure of true commitment – are you prepared to die for it. In fact, are you dying for it every day. Death requires the ultimate act of abandon – a great leap with faculties gleaming but with nothing clinging to hold you back. Like my teacher's father said to me before he died a few days ago: “Steven, I'm really looking forward to it! I know it's going to be a peak experience!” He'll always be my measure of selflessness.