Why Are You Here? I — Peace and Happiness

I wanted to remind us of why we are here. Not the BIG question of “Why are we here at all?”, but rather the more mundane, but equally grand question of why we are here every week to practice together.

Some of us on the spiritual path feel the need to engage with group practice on a regular basis to strengthen our karmic connection to the teachings and the practice.

Some of us are more focused on the connection with like-minded practitioners and being able to share our thoughts, concerns, and experiences in and about our practice in a safe and supportive space.

Some come looking for a new understanding of the best techniques to help “let go” of our grip on habitual patterns of thinking and reacting and thus open our minds and relax into our true nature.

Some recognize that this practice time may be one of the few opportunities for our overly active “monkey minds” to relax and just “be,” without all the “doing” our daily life seems to demand.

Though we may come for all of these reasons (and more) to some degree, there is one reason that underlies all of our other ideas of why we practice. We just want to be peaceful and happy in our lives. It is really that simple. If we are peaceful and happy, then we are, by definition, not suffering. We are accepting what arises in our lives and dealing with it in the best way we can, without worry and regret.

The funny (peculiar, not ha-ha) thing is that our True Nature is spacious, peaceful, aware, joyful, and compassionate. So, our real desire on the spiritual path is simply to reconnect with, or to reveal, the peace and happiness that is always present as the nature of our mind, our spacious pure awareness.