Many cultures demonize rest. They believe it leads to selfish licentious behaviour. I can see why people think so, but it isn’t actually the cause. Rest serves as a mirror of your state. When you rest, your state of mind becomes abundantly clear. You can become incredibly frustrated and angry.
So idleness won’t let the devil inside? Idleness won’t. The devil was already inside, because the devil is in the details. All those petty little things that everyone tells you are so very important. All the petty little goals that people will hurt you to get you to help with.
Rest is clarity. To draw an insight from the Bible, it actually said that in order to commune with God you had to withdraw from the world, enter into your private place.
“Be still and know that I am God.” Exactly, and when in private not fill it with vane repetition of prayer, but instead silent reflection. Rest, in other words.
When you achieve even no thought, there is more rest, more clarity. When you achieve no thought, all your thoughts become very clear, because your brain doesn’t actually stop thinking. But you see each thought for what it is, how it happens in your mind, and what it either works with or against. A lot of broken processes can end. Come to rest.
I can see the silence between thoughts. It is lightning fast. But even in that instant one can linger. Light, the flash of lighting, leaving an impression on your retina. Anything you experience, no matter how fleeting, stays with you. Your subconscious mind logs literally every nerve impulse. It’s just your conscious mind that screens it out until it’s surprised later by a vision of something that you never thought you saw, words you never thought you heard. But when do these occur to you? When you rest.
This reminds me of how my deja vu can sometime stop me in my tracks. You experience deja vu when resting. You can rest and be doing the dishes or some other chore. Those moments when you are doing something, but you aren’t particularly worried about it. You know it will get done. These are rest.
This path has a fully developed teaching behind it in Chinese philosophy. They call the path non-doing, which doesn’t mean you avoid anything, but you live your life without the idea that you DO things. You talk without trying to say anything in particular. You eat without worrying about how much or how little. You love without worrying about being loved or being free of others. This is the wisdom of rest, and there are many ways to rest. So why do we avoid it like the plague?
We think we are resting when we are not. Indeed, we have an idea of fun. The idea of fun and the actual principle of fun are often very different things.
People think addictive behaviour like gambling and drinking is resting because they are not “at work”. They do, and fill their lives with worry as a consequence.
We fear that the world will kill us. That is the only fear. It has and had a purpose, but it wasn’t so general as it is now. The cat rests often and without guilt, because it knows in its wisdom that the world will not kill it. It just needs to avoid dog. We have real reason to have fear. There are still things that can kill us. But in my view, if the world itself means to kill me, well… Then it’s time for me to go, and I still have nothing to worry about.
Your thoughts are welcome. Be well friends.
Travis Saunders
Dragon Intuitive
~science,mysticism,spirituality~