Wherever You Go, There You Are

Two of my readers have asked where this phrase comes from and what it means. (I have readers?!)

It is claimed that the saying goes back to Confucius.

Wherever You Go etc. is also the title of a book by Jon Kabat-Zinn, with a subtitle of Mindfulness Meditations In Everyday Life. I've learned something of mindfulness meditation and it is the path my meditation usually takes. Jon Kabat-Zinn also wrote Full Catastrophe Living, which I haven't read, but probably am ready for, now that the catastrophe lives not so much in the present. Two other books come to mind: Be Here Now by Ram Dass, and Eckhart Tolle's Power of Now. They all teach the same lesson. Ram Dass' book was written in 1971, and is followed, after Ram Dass' full catastrophic stroke, by Still Here. 

That lesson finally came home to roost last night. I'd been the day before to look at a place to live in Burbank, near to my daughter. There are many good reasons for that move, my therapist, psychiatrist, and son all think it's a great idea for me. Of course there are pros and cons, as there are for everything, but weighing those didn't solve my dilemma. Confucius did. The truth is that I came away from viewing the truly wonderful apartment opportunity with only one thought screaming - "Give me a lot of chocolate, now!" That was the first clue that my mind  - my soul? - was trying to tell me something that had nothing to do with pros and cons. That thought grew through the next 24 hours, and became fully-grown and intelligible: Mostly I want to move because I think I am uncomfortable Where I Am. I am uncomfortable, period. There is good reason for this (see Full Catastrophe!) but the solution is not to take myself elsewhere, but to go inward and become comfortable there. I am Here Now. Where I live will be an easy transition in space, not an arduous dilemma; a smooth flow, not a rocky terrain to clamber through. I am reminded to be more diligent in meditation.

Let's check back in a year - in five years. 

For today, I took the 134 to the 170 to the 5, off the freeway in Merced, and then backroads to Murphys. I am Here Now.