Letting the Water Settle

This morning I went to the local store for my newspaper. While chatting, my friend the manager mentioned that her 20-year-old son was having a down spell, mildly depressed but mainly pondering why each day seemed the same -- off to work, back home, off to work etc. -- same old grind each day with nothing on the horizon to perk him up. He was asking, "what is life for, what's it all about, why am I here, Is this all there is?"

I told the mother that Zen, one of the highest mystical paths for seekers of wisdom, held in high regard the phrase,"Before enlightenment, Zen is chopping wood, carrying water; after enlightment, Zen is chopping wood, carrying water." So, if our life is this way -- just work each day, no wonder we get depressed. But the Zen saying also has in it a secret, which is that the attitude you have, your spiritual state, can transform profoundly the everyday mundane action into the transcendent. An ancient Hindu phrase says it well,"The walk of an enlightened man is as different from the walk of an unenlightened man as that of a giraffe from an elephant."

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