The Scar of the Avatar

THE SCAR OF THE AVATAR

Through all these years

Amidst many tears

I have come to find

The source of my fears

 

Not knowing oneself

The source of pain itself

Looking far and wide

Across every divide

 

Ere this moment came to me

Looking around I would see

Answers false from without

With short lived joy I would shout

 

Eventually it occurred to me

The moment that would set me free

When before me a paragon I saw

That deflected my direction

To self reflection

 

What I looked for so long and far

Was a copy of me, an avatar

In knowing this new found fact

‘Twould be hard to distract

 

And now I search no more

No further reason to explore

Within is a new found peace

From which a burden was released

 

If one day it is meant to be

I will clearly see

And with a certainty

The end of my search, my destiny

-Shiidon, January 2008

Although it was a chilly morning I went down to the creek.  I had just spoken with two of my students in Iran and was ready for some time to myself.  I sat for an hour listening to the running water, the morning sounds of birds around.  The wind rustling through the winter trees.  As I sat there I noticed for the first time that there are fish in the still water that rests on my property.  The neighbors on both sides of me have rocks creating brakes in the water.  My section is a quiet section of water.  The sound is not quite "stereo" in a way as the water sounds different on either side.  As I sat there praying, meditating and sitting at peace I spied movement going the wrong way, upstream.  What I saw eventually turned out to be a turtle.  I watched it approach the first obstacle with purpose and eventually made it over the first rocks.  it then did not go directly ahead to the next rocks, with almost a defying movement it headed directly towards the rushing and strongest water coming the other way.  Eventually it made it into the quiet water and moved with haste upstream.  I was amazed at how focused and determined it was to go where it willed to.  I arose to follow it but it must have taken note of me as it proceeded to burrow itself into the dead leaves at the bottom of the stream.

How easy it would be to follow the stream and go "with the flow" as they say.  I believe, however, that we are needing to be turtles these days.  We know that the best direction is upstream and that we need to hit the obstacles that we find along the way head on.  The easiest way to attain our goal is sometimes resulting from going to and overcoming the most severe tests that we find ourselves in.

I posted this photo on my facebook but for those who do not have my facebook page this is a photo of me on a teaching project in the Bahamas.  The girl with me is Christi Ryan and the other guy is Dorian Hale.  You may have seen his grandfather Allen Hale who played the skipper on Gilligan's Island.  This photo was taken on a ridge between what was the Holiday Inn and Club Med on Paradise Island, Nassau, New Providence.  If you click on the photo it will zoom in.