Ah, the futility of it all. Of knowing that I keep sliding down that slippery slope only to do the same 10 hard yards all over agian. Or 10kg. Or whatever.
That’s why I said way back at the start that it has to be a paradigm shift. A new mindset. But perhaps it’s a mind-body thing. They both have to be ready. No, the body is always ready for something better to be fed into it. It’s definitely a mind thing.
How does one become an enlightened being? Is it a slow sunrise, inexorable and from darkness to brilliance in imperceptible stages? Or is it the flicking of a light switch to instant light? Perhaps it works differently for different kinds of people.
I don’t know. All I know is the futility of having even a modicum of knowledge and not using it. Of knowing what to do and not doing it. Every day is a new opportunity to do well, to honour our bodies, our selves, our world. Yet many of us go through life in a dream state, never really awakening to the truth of how to eat, to think, to live. I think it has become too hard. We are bombarded with so much information, some of it which may be right!, that we end up with overload and our reaction is to overload our bodies as well.
We think we have to be able to create amazing vegan dishes, or paleo masterpieces or whatever is the diet flavour of the month. We have to be foodie whatevers. We need a title, a name, an identity. We don’t simply eat. Within a span of 20 years the game has seemingly changed forever. And yet there are people in the world who every day do not get enough to eat or who eat the same kind of food every day and are content with that.
For me, my kitchen habits changed when my cirumstances changed, and I have never returned to the more disciplined and more simple meals of that time. Some of it is an expectation. I think that now I have to be able to prepare so many different types of foods. I think that what I had in the past was not good enough for today’s sophisticated world. But at the heart of things, I know this is wrong. I know that simplicity is good. Simplicity is the state to strive for, to accomplish. Meals can be simple affairs. They do not have to be orchestrated and presented with overt flair. They just need to be made of the right componentry.
So today I am thinking to simplify at least some of the meals in our house. To clear some of the backlogs in other parts of my life as well and to pay attention to how simple I can make the repetitive things in my life.
It seems to me that enlightened beings never have complexity in their life. They see things clearly and their lives have an enviable simplicity. They’re not addicted to anything. They don’t crave complex cuisine. They are happy with simple and natural. And that in itself is fulfilling enough.