Little pieces of gold in struggling?

If you have not noticed that the struggle never quite seems to be over, no matter what you do or achieve, you not worry it is a feature not a bug of life, it is the necessary roughage that produces the real gold of life. It is only by struggle that we get to experience the contrast of joy and peace, like a boat tacking in a headwind, you are blown and battered one way and then the other, but when you are tacking there is a moment of peace in-between, where you almost float and then you are back into the struggle, the trick is to notice it even whilst you are pulling on the rope and turning the rudder. Only by noticing more can you appreciate the peace that is contained in the struggle.

Sitting in the park and reading a book is pleasurable, with friends it can be a delight, however it is even sweeter when it is the reward after a hard week's work. It has to have context to be enjoyed, a homeless person does not have more peace because they are in the park every hour of the day without an alternative or hope of escape. However they do have the same opportunities to find peace even when they are on such a difficult road, that is because we all struggle, even billionaires struggle, not with money, every problem that money can solve is resolved, which leaves everything else. They might be higher quality problems as the phase goes, and it should be recogised that it is a privilege to have them but they are no less troubling to those experiencing them, all suffering is relative to the self not others.

You do not get to paid someone else to eat a happy and healthy diet whilst you dig into a pile of donuts, no-one else can do your running, meditation, personal development for you. There is an endless list of personal responsibilities that is entirely down to you, the quality of your relationships is down to you turning up, putting in the time, listening and respecting the boundaries of others. You are the one who has to decide how honest or kind you want to be, whether you use soft or hard compassion, are your principles more important than the feelings of others. These are questions that do not have simple answers that is why the Buddhist can solve suffering with just three observations that all life contains suffering, all suffering comes from the self and accepting that will lead to enlightenment, however it does require a single action that you lead a right life, which leads to eight right modes of being in the world and hundreds of books to guide you.

It is leading a good life that is the difficult part in Buddhism so that you can have the peace to sit with yourself and experience enlightenment. Which means that anyone who is trying to be a growing being of consciousness, that is anyone who is trying to be a little bit better than they were yesterday is actually doing the hard part of being Buddhist even if they do not realise it. As the old story goes, a monk who had spent twenty years sitting in a cave (as they are liable to do) descended to the village below him in a state of perfect enlightenment, and the first thing to happen to him is that a cart runs over his foot and he lets out a cry of pain and swears so much even the gods hear him, at which point he turns around and goes back to his cave because he realises he is not really enlighten if he can not be in the company of others.

Which was probably the wrong move, he should have turned towards that pain not run back to the cave, the troubles that occur when we live together in a busy, frenetic and productive life, that is where real peace is to be found, that is where you get to use all that practice. As after all what is the point of practise if you never get to use and share that skill of maintain your peace even in the face of struggles, it is like an expert fisherman who never cast their rods, who never struggles against a fish who is trying to escape, even if you let the fish go after catching them, there is value in that struggle, in testing your skills, doing what you practise in the real world.

I respect someone who tries to do hard things and fail a lot more than those who are naturals and find things easy, where is the growth in that, where is the joy it is like getting a reward for breathing, if that is all the effort it took you. To be fair, the naturals myth is probably just that, a fantasy where people can just do thing without any effort, every person who has won an Olympic gold medal, has done so because they work and practised for thousands of hours, they had potential but it was down to them putting in the time, no one ever just turned up and won. We are draw to the myth because we think it in having skill and fortune that peace and happiness is found, that is because the people who achieve things are happy, not from the achievement but because they surrendered to the process of becoming an expert, the goal was where they were going. The achievement was the destination that guided their actions in the moment.

That is why goals are important, and when your daily actives are in alignment with those long term goals, they are more satisfying, meaningful and full of purpose. They are not just routine, the boring repetitions of the same task, the exact same actions that you would take if you were just surviving, if you need money to pay the rent and for food and you were working sixty hours a week to do so, they would be soul destroying if they had no larger meaning. It is the lacking of meaning that undermines our happiness, the real gold is in the struggle to find meaning in the moment, not in the avoidance of struggle and suffering.

The simplest way to do so is by simply noting everything in your consciousness at any particular moment, as when you note something the mind checks it off and it moves on to next thing, instead of dwelling on it and reacting, it frees you up to observe so much more, you note twenty things in the time that most people think about one, you speed up and see more. The difficult part is to keep on doing it, that is where concentration comes in, by improving it, you get to keep on noting, and your experience becomes deeper, wide and more focused. This is why living a good life is not just one action in one moment but instead a long series of small moments, it is choosing a path and way of being in the world that persists and that you want to live with.

The gold of life is always around us, it is a rich vein that runs through our life and in every moment even the worst ones, we simply have to start seeing and observing it, which sounds simple but is very hard in prastise. That is because our senses are incredibly sensitive to any stimulus, they notice change, whatever is happening you focus on that, and something is always occurring, the external world is ever present, you have to choose to take your attention away from the most obvious thing that is filling your consciousness in that moment, so that you can notice what else is going on. Once you start it is addictive as it bring a depth to each moment that is not there without your attention, the world will keep you busy if you let it, you have to decide to find your joy, to go deeper, live with your suffering and find that gold.