Who would you be without your personal story?
Would consciousness finally rest in its Lord?
Perhaps you would just roll out of your body
and into a waiting boat. No one would be watching
during the time it takes to leave your dreaming
and glide out onto the vast liquid expanse.
No one would film your departure.
No one would wave from the dock.
You’d be completely on your own.
Your hopes and fears, goals and cares —
all of that belonged to the leading character
in the engaging drama, but you aren’t that one.
All compelling theater originates in the mind,
so you’ve set sail on the boat of no-thought.
Identity and fixation, all craving and resistance
begin as mind forms, streaming across the oceanic
chasm between the world of your imagination
and the objective world of actualization.
Since nothing that you can conceive
or perceive has any enduring substance
except as props on your empty stage,
you’ve grown weary of all masks,
costumes, and screenplays.
What are they, after all,
but swiftly vanishing memories,
bits of flotsam trailing now behind you
in the churning froth of your passing wake?
Ahead, the immensity of the unknown beckons
in pristine innocence. For once, you have no idea
what will happen. Savor the utter thrill of that,
and then, without hesitation, sail on!
The Mysterious Expanse 