Sometimes to go deeper, we step back

Zen?  What is that?  I can’t say I ever heard of it.  This is how I feel right now, and it is as refreshing as cool mountain air.  This thing, Zen, perhaps I think about it too much, rely on it too much, even identify with it too much.  To not have it in my thoughts and routines is freeing.  I have cancelled my docusan appointments, have not been going to sewing class, to Young Urban Zen.  I even cancelled my training session today at Green Gulch to give garden tours to kids.  Obviously, I have not been writing much, but only recently am I happy about that.

There is only one thing in my life right now, and it is called a thesis.  It’s going to be done in a few weeks.  And it all makes me think that...

Sometimes in life, going deeper means stepping back.  We have all had to do it in our relationships, with our partners, our families, our friends.  Sometimes we need to do it with our professions, with activities we love, with our biggest goals in life... and with our spiritual paths.  Sometimes we need to step back for a long time, sometimes for a short time.  When this thesis is done, I’m stepping back: even if I wanted to, I don’t think I could fruitfully think any more about how history teachers can help students understand prejudice.  This is just the beginning of my work, but before I go deeper, I need some fresh air.  Until my mind stops obsessing over the data gathered, assessed, and synthesized from seventy articles on the subject and a hundred of my own ideas, I am a blind man.  

It was hard to give myself over to the thesis.  For a couple months, my body had been telling me, “Hey Lynn, don’t think about anything else right now.  Let go of Zen.  Let go of other things.  Just sink into the thesis, eat good food, go for runs each day... that’s it”.  I feel really calm having finally accepted my bodies advice.  

Sometimes stepping back means you can let go of anxiety.  Sometimes it means you can attain a better focus or place your focus elsewhere.  It can be a means to gain perspective, to see something more clearly, to understand why something is valuable to you or how it can better fit into your life.  For all these reasons stepping back from Zen for a month feels right.  And then, stepping back from my intellectual work will feel right.  Stepping back from both is right, because I want to go deeper - much deeper - into both.