it was fruitility but now its gone

One of the first questions to arise on my spiritual path was this: Am I just kidding myself that life is a spiritual journey, that in meditation I am getting to know my soul, that life is full of meaning and beautiful purpose? Is this really true or does wanting it not actually make it so?

As far as I can tell the actual truth is unknowable. That said, it has become apparent to me that there are no truths out there that matter nearly so much as the truths we choose to tell ourselves about our own lives. And it is a choice. Everything but everything is a choice. And thank goodness for this means that our destiny is in our own hands and what better place is there for it? When we believe that other people are to blame for our circumstances, we are powerless to change them. When we accept that we are responsible for our lives, we are suddenly free to change.

I remember my friend S telling me how she told her mother about a nightmare in which she was driving a car that was out of control. Her mother C, a woman full of verve and joy, responded, “Well dear, at least you were driving the car.” At the time we laughed at that, but I think I know now what she meant by it.

I’ve experimented with more than a few “truths” in my time. Around age 20, for example, atheism and nihilism seemed de rigueur. De rigor mortis more like. I followed their premises that god is dead and life is meaningless to what seemed to me their natural conclusions that we are here only to eke out what pleasures we may and therefore played, ate, drank, and smoked my way through the next decade. But what I had once perceived as de rigueur turned out to be no more than a dead end. 

So then I tried a lot of different things like throwing spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks. Here’s one piece that stuck: I found a new truth far more appealing than the old. I decided to tell myself the best possible story about my life that I could imagine – just as I would look for the best story to tell any other sweet child. This shift made such a difference in my perception of and therefore my reaction to absolutely everything in my life that from now on only the most fun, most loving, most caring and beautiful stories will do. This old Indian story is one of my favorites, among many beautiful tales:

In this story all of us are one soul. We used to be one, one blissfully perfect soul (but as we think we know blissfully perfect gets boring and so…) it was only for our own amusement and entertainment that we chose to split our one soul up to become the ten thousand things of this world – so we could play with ourselves essentially. And of course any good play needs drama and conflict to be interesting so we needed bad guys as well as good to make the play engaging. At the end of the play, the ten thousand things will dissolve again back into that one sweet soul, which in truth we have never stopped being except for our game of pretending.

My inner pessimist usually whispers in around this point with:

“Could I have a word please – just take a second. Right. Aren’t you just pretending really and isn’t it true that none of this is actually true?”

“Well, I don’t know.” I confess to self, “But I do know this: my life has been way more fun and I have become more loving and more caring since I started telling myself this truth/story or since I started pretending as you so rightly call it.”

The pessimist sniffs and shuffles off, tossing a murmured, “Point taken” over a surly shoulder.

Besides just generally having way more fun believing in a spiritual, loving universe, pretending offers the added benefit that I am actively participating in the creation of my life and where it is off to next. I like the feeling of freedom, power, magic and mystery that comes from knowing that. My life is in good hands because it is in my hands and I am lovingly conspiring with the universe/my soul/whatever-you-want-to-call-it to take good care of it and to have a heck of a lot of fun in the process.

I find this principle so delicious as to merit its own name and so I’ve christened it Pippi’s Razor (with a little help from R and Occam and Astrid Lundgren). It states:

Pippi’s Razor is the decision to evaluate, perceive, and view life in light of the most fun, loving, beautiful stories possible.

Does that make the fun, loving, beautiful story I’m telling myself true? Nope. Does that matter in the least? Nope again.