I feel trapped.

Trapped by the inherited and self-created stories and beliefs—some of which infer that I am trapped and without tools to break free of their reach. I am exhausted by the effort.

I am fed up—I am utterly and completely spent.

I am tired yes, but I am not going to lie down and wither.

I’m not going to lie down and allow my physical motion to devolve into mental abdication to a television program.

No.

I am not going to go to drift into sleep, where all is forgotten but for dreams, and I can postpone the inevitable break of day.

No.

I’m not going to crouch in front of the computer screen and pander my way through websites, emails and a virtual world of pixelated relationships, searching for meaning in the realm where machine meets technology.

No.

I am not going to lift the whiskey bottle and watch liquid despair flow freely into the over-sized glass, cracking the ice as it promises equal damage in me.

No.

I’m not going to clutch my iPhone, with the tiny keypad send signals to anyone that I want attention and then tether it to me, so as to not miss the inadequate morsels it spills.

No.

I am done. I quit. I am just not going to participate anymore.

This is my rebellion: I am just going to sit still.

I am just going to sit still and stop the needing. Stop the running. Stop the yearning, hoping, clinging, wanting, avoiding, grasping, drinking, crying, choking, pulling, pushing, numbing, cramping, aching, hurting, speaking, eating, tripping, falling, and flailing. I’m done. I am just fucking done.

I refuse; I refuse to keep acting on the feelings I experience that are as transient and as fleeting as dreams.

These feelings move about chaotically, and as soon as I think I’m acting on something solid—it changes! As soon as I think I have ground beneath me, it crumbles suddenly and instead of standing firm, I am left trying to figure out how to either fly or fall.  It is a game I don’t want to play, much less win.

The more I look the more I am convinced, there will never be anything permanent that arises in me. To look for the assurance of something that has no end, or the security of something to hold on to, or the discovery of something that ultimately matters—here among these ephemeral emotions, feelings, ideas and stories, is not where I will find it.

And so I am going to sit and I am going to stay.

Will you sit with me?

I will sit until the chaos settles, until the rapture heals, until the sunrise sets.

We will sit until we are immune to the persuasion of seduction.

I will sit until I meet the One that is not changing.

We will sit until we find even a glimpse of what is permanent, to look to for meaning in life.

I will sit until I see the one who is sitting.

We will sit until we cannot sit any longer.

Will you sit with me?

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Photo: elephant archives