craving (part 1)

When driven by craving, I am convinced that if only I were to achieve this goal, all would be well.

While creating the illusion of a purposeful life, craving is really the loss of direction.

It is a process of compulsive becoming.

It spins me around in circles, covering the same ground again and again.

Each time I think I have found a situation that solves all my problems,

it suddenly turns out to be a reconfiguration of the very situation I thought I was escaping from.

My sense of having found a new lease on life turns out to be merely a repetition of the past.

I realize I am running on the spot, frantically going nowhere.



Life becomes a succession of minibirths and minideaths.

When I achieve what I want, I feel reborn.

But no sooner have I settled into this feeling than the old anxieties resurface.

The new possession swiftly ages as it is diminished by the allure of something more desirable that I do not have.

What seemed perfect is abruptly compromised by alarming glimpses of its imperfections.

Instead of solving my problems, this new situation replaces them with others I had never suspected.

Yet rather than accepting this as the nature of living in an unreliable world,

rather than learning to be content with success and joy and not to be overwhelmed by failure and pain,

rather than appreciating life's poignant, tragic, and sad beauty,

I grit my teeth and struggle on in thrall to that quiet, seductive voice that whispers:

"If only..."

~Stephen Batchelor