Nothing Special

I have had, for most of my, life a sense that I was missing some key piece of information.  Without which, I was somehow incomplete or flawed in some way.  It didn't help that, as a very young kid, I had a terrible stutter and could barely talk. Kids can be cruel and I got laughed at a lot.  But really, that was only part of the problem.  I just always felt like I was not enough. 

Image by Darren Hester via Flickr

I was certain that if I just discovered this missing piece of information that all the craziness in my life would just fade away and everything would just fall into place. A light bulb would flash on, and chase away the darkness.

Now as I approach my 42nd birthday, I realize I have been missing the point all along.  There are no answers, there are no missing pieces of information. There is no destination, that once arrived at, will set me free.

What there is...  is "Nothing Special". There is just life, lived wide awake. Right Now!

First let me back up...

At about the age of 12 or 13, I discovered that smoking marijuana and drinking removed that sense of lack. I doubt I would have expressed it that way at the time.  I just knew that I felt "great" when I was high or drunk, and I felt like a loser when I wasn't.  As a result from the ages of 13 to 23 I drank a lot.  Far too much.  And as is the nature of such "cures", they stopped working, and left me with my original problem as well as a new onem an addiction to drug and alcohol.

I got sober at 23.  And that began my real focused search for answers. I tried everything, self help books, support groups, religion.  All of them were helpful, some profoundly so, but I was still missing the point.

I was looking feverishly for some Special Understanding that I was certain the truly successful people already had. I was pretty certain that its revelation would be accompanied by some pretty serious pomp and circumstance. Possibly even a choir of angels. Ok, well maybe not a choir of angels, but at least it would seem very, very deep and profound.  It would very obvious how special it was.

Image by slimmer_jimmer via Flickr

I was looking for something to cure me.  First it was drugs and alcohol, later it became intellectual understanding. I believed that Once I understood whatever it was i was missing, I would suddenly be free and then and only then would my real life start.

The problem was that I was always waiting for the end of the journey.  In my own mind, tomorrow's imagined understanding became more important then what was happening right now. Today!

I had badly missed the point.  And all the stuff I had been reading, all the great teacher's of ancient times, and even our own cultures common sense teachings and wisdoms had been giving me the answer all along.

It is not the destination it is the journey.

Image by giveawayboy via Flickr

It is the very ordinary things that happen every day, all the time, that deserve and in fact require, our attention.  These things that seem like they are Nothing Special are worthy of our respect.  These present moments are our greatest teachers if only we can be aware of them.

There is no great understanding to gain. There is no Eureka moment.  But if we can learn to focus our attention on what is happening right now, we will learn all we ever need to know.  We will see what needs to be done and we will do it.

If your like me and your try to live this way, you might find that it is pretty difficult at first. I have an extremely overactive discriminating brain. It loves to just chatter at me all the time. And what it is telling me, isn't always very useful.  So I tend to drift off into daydreams or worries or fears, and forget about what I am doing.  I loose the present moment.  

Thats ok.  It happens. And here is the thing. It doesn't matter!  What does matter is to try. Only try, try, try!  That is the journey and it is far more important then actually getting anywhere.

Image via Wikipedia

ps.  This Nothing Special idea is not my own. In fact, none of this is my own original thinking.  It only has my style applied to it, probably to it's detriment. Nothing Special comes to me from a Korean Zen Master named Seung Sahn.  I use Nothing Special as a reminder to help me pay attention!  I need all the reminders I can get!