There’s That Thing

Louis C.K. was on the late night show, talking to Conan O’Brien about smart phones. He is a remarkably intelligent comedian, shining light into the dark places in our culture and conditioning. He was pointing to what we are trying to avoid in our obsession with our phones, emails, music, texting, Facebook, Youtube, etc.

“We need to learn to just sit and do nothing, “ he said. “That’s called ‘being a person.’ We don’t do that. Because underneath everything in your life, there’s that thing–that empty, forever empty. You know what I’m talking about?”

Conan leaned a little closer and said, “Yes, yes I do.”

I was astonished by this conversation. I know that a lot of things happen on late night TV that are outside the box of the prime time shows, but this was so real, so stark. The cat was right out of the bag.

Louis C.K. went on to describe how much sadness is there when you stop running away from yourself, and what a beautiful thing it can be to stop fighting and just let yourself feel the sadness.

But even feelings can be a kind of distraction from that big space of forever empty. That big empty is what’s left when you let go of everything. When you get so exhausted with holding on that you even let go of yourself.

We don’t know what that space is. We’re all running around together, filling our days with noise, activity, problems, plans, projects, resentments, crimes, victories, passions, purposes and memories. The last thing we ever consider is just resting in that wide open space that is forever empty. Too vast, too open, too infinite to be filled up.

 

Imagine if your friend said to you, “Come on over tonight and we’ll just rest in the big empty together.” Or if the guys decided to sit round the barbecue and just “hang for a while in the big empty.” Crazy! Our whole culture has decided that’s really not a good idea. Really, anything but that.

There are cultures where people know how to be with each other in that way. They seem to be disappearing quite rapidly, but they still exist. In that emptiness, there’s a lot of room for the heart to open, a lot of space for intimacy. But only when you relax down through all the layers of fear, aversion, and avoidance.

There was a queen in ancient India, Medulsa. Every night while her children were going to sleep, she sang to them about their true nature, who they were underneath all of the appearances. Imagine if your mother had sung to you, from the very beginning, about the terrible, sacred beauty of the big emptiness. Can you hear her singing to you, night after night, about her deep love for that nothing that lives at the heart of everything?

If that was how you feel asleep, all through your childhood, who would you be now? If you knew that big empty was your ground, your source, your freedom, how would you live your life?

I don’t think the craziness that is eating away at our world from all directions can be dealt with on any kind of superficial level. The frantic level of our collective activity continues to increase, exponentially. Until we can make friends with the big empty, we’ll just keep running.

 

The birds don’t alter space.
They reveal it. The sky
never fills with any
leftover flying. They leave
nothing to trace. It is our own
astonishment collects
in chill air. Be glad

(Li-Young Lee ‘Praise Them’)

 

with love,
Shayla