What are you, really?

According to the insight of the Buddha, we are not at all what we seem. Like everything else in the universe, we are impermanent, a karmically conditioned, patterned flow of change. We are more like a river than a rock, more like a rainbow than like steel.

When we see ourselves, others, and the world around us this way, if we understand it deeply enough, we will see that there is nothing to cling to, grasp at, or upset ourselves about. We are free. Since everything is flowing and changing all the time, the only thing to do is appreciate the flow, get with it, harmonize ourselves with it. Struggle against the nature of things only wears you out for no reason. Rest your weary mind.

Life is wondrous becoming. You are wondrous becoming. We don’t have to repeat the mistakes of the past. We can grow and change and evolve.

So smile.