Day 123 – Killing Buddha

The quote “if you meet the buddha” kept popping into my head today, that’s later. It started with we’re back from a wonderful weekend, I was relaxed and feeling very cruisy.  It was a moment-to-moment adventure as I tuned into where the day needed to take me.  This meant we lunched in a fast-food restaurant, which is incredibly rare, but the mood just felt right.  Let’s just say, the kilojoule count was high.  Maybe I was on the way to becoming a buddha!

Today, it didn’t matter – it just felt in the moment.  There are times when being in the moment is more difficult than others, today it was easy.  Anyway, while my husband was waiting for the food to be made, I was able to take a moment and sink totally into the now.

There had been a lot of late nights and while I love visiting my friend, sleeping at her place is a struggle because I respond to the foxie’s need to join us in the bed.  We sleep with the door closed, with me slipping into a light sleep state more often than my husband, it’s me who gets up to let the dog in and out. 

So, there was the chance sleep deprivation was contributing to the slightly dreamy state.  In this dreamy state, I felt connected to everything.  The road, the traffic noise, the noise of the children in the play area of the restaurant.  Everything around me had a crispness to it and all the while conscious of my breathing and my heartbeat.  The way my teeth were sitting, the tongue’s position the saliva build-up and swallow, toe, and finger positions.  Connected.

Earlier in the day we spoke of what “killing Buddha” really means.  The quote, “if you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him” is, of course, metaphorical.  There are various interpretations depending upon the source.  In verifying my memory of the quote, there was an Abstract by Michael Jerryson which provoked my curiosity; Jerryson writes, “[t]he statement deliberately confounds people and is meant to jolt them from complacent ways of thinking”. It’s an article, I hope to get back to read just to see where the paper leads.  For now, I will refrain from pursing it further in the interests of keeping my thoughts to the memory of earlier today.

The statement doesn’t confound me, except in its cleverness.  Here goes my attempt at conveying what it means to me. First, the analogy. Think of everyone’s destiny as a room, house, or bed.  When you and a friend decide to visit a centrally located restaurant to catch up.  Your friend knows the area as he’s been there before but you’re new and unfamiliar with the location.

The end of the night arrives and you both need to head home.  Your friend offers to drive you to a drop off point near the freeway, he’ll point the direction you’re meant to go, and he’ll loop back and head toward his place.  Once you’re on the freeway it should be familiar, and you can take it from there.

So, your friend drives you to the drop off point but just at the point off moment, something happens and suddenly you’re unsure of whether you interpreted your friend’s pointing correctly.  The safety you felt in following his path now needs to change. You doubt yourself.  You’re unsure whether you’re on the right path to your home or whether you read the queue correctly.  You thought saw it, but …

In the analogy, you could try and catch-up with your friend because you saw which way he went.  In the end, you’d just wind up at his house maybe a little red-faced.  If you didn’t want to end up red-faced and realised early enough, you could head off down a side street and wind up more lost than before.  You’d still be red-faced but at least you’re the only one to know it but you’re also miserable because you’re still not home.

To put analogy against the metaphor, imagine the friend in the analogy is Buddha.  Buddha knows where he lives, following after the drop off point doesn’t get you to your destination. It gets you to his destination, but you don’t have a key to get into his house. 

Put simply, “killing Buddha on the road” is the moment when you part ways.  You can only follow the teachings of great masters or wisemen so far, after that point you’re on your own.  Yours and everyone else’s uniqueness requires it.  There is no one in time like you nor will there be, it only makes sense then that your destinies are going to be different.