Change of the Seasons

Studying the Dharma as it blows into my mind on Fall winds, and seeps into my being with the heavy rains. Looking out I see people, things, moving. Thinking, talking, feeling, worrying. The sun shining in the sky. Time passing gently in the background. Who notices this? Caught up in ourselves, we forget that all of this is passing. It cannot be held forever, but comes briefly then vanishes. Nothing stays the same, nothing can be forced to remain the same. The power over this life is not our own, nor does it cling to things. Clinging to things as sentient beings, it remains empty of attachment, as impassive as the natural world. We exist in this world, yet this world is empty of self. And selfishness is suffering. Peace is not personal victory, but awakening into Emptiness which is beyond self. We are not free to fully dispose ourselves to eliminate suffering when we cling to our individual egos and let them dominate our existence. Dominion by the self paralyzes the movement of consciousness towards liberated perspective. Ignorance of the reality of Peace and the way to peace lead us on countless paths of endless egoic striving. Which is striving born out of attachment. When we realize the truth of the way to Peace we drop this striving like a weary soldier drops his sword and abandons the field of battle. Ignorance of this truth is an ignorance that is belief in the wisdom of the self or of selfishness. This is the same as the dominating view of a heart being that conditioned forms are real, and that we as and individual are one of them and can live forever as one of them. So attached are we to this narrative that we endure all kinds of suffering to bring about the Supreme Victory of this illusory being. How can any conditioned form have Supreme Victory? As it exists, it exists in perpetual conflict with the imagined multitude of other conditioned forms. For it to exist, a universe of opposing forces and competing wills must exist. It is the belief in the Reality of one's own separate existence. Separate from what? Something else that is separate from it. Something it can never be, for it is it's own self and divided from the world. It's own selfishness will keep it from understanding the Other, from being interested in doing so, so it will forever be ignorant of the nature of the Other and the true relationship between the Other and itself. In it's pride it will believe in it's own superior ability to dominate the Other. This blinds it and it advances blindly and foolishly. It does not recognize that the Other has just as much power as itself, and that in seeking to dominate, it gives the Other the same power to dominate it. For it does not recognize that the Other is itself, and the each are empty of self, and are truly Empty. In the darkness of it's own awareness it experiences the world as other and a boundary between it's feelings and those of the world. It does not see that it's heart has no boundary and is rather living itself than any particular living entity. It is apart of the World which is alive and it's mind and will are one with this World. It's feelings of selfishness are the worlds feelings of selfishness, when it dominates the World, it is ignorant that it is also dominating itself, its own feeling, and is creating misery and disease within itself, it's own mind, flesh and feeling. For it's feeling, which contains both mind and flesh, are One with the feeling that is the mind and flesh of the living world. The world is alive and is more like one living thing with many centers of feeling and consciousness than a collective of disparate organisms with competing wills. Many organisms do not realize they are apart of this expansive feeling, yet it exists there nonetheless. Home is where the heart is, and this home is the wide open world. Frodo Baggins is highly sensitive to this living field, which is why he is the ring bearer of the One ring, which is a perversion of this feeling into a belief that something so precious as the living, feeling world, could be contained in one object by one individual will. Frodo's  great sensitivity of this feeling allows him to master his own selfish impulses to the extraordinary extent necessary to deliver the ring to it's own undoing. Thus the worth of the Shire and all it's green abundance, is truly the abundance of this sensitivity to feeling that Frodo has. I think the Hobbit's at heart are Green Communitarians, which gives rise to their surprising sturdiness and capability. Not just in thought, but in heart, which is both much more powerful and much more difficult to achieve. It makes them greater than perhaps even elves. I don't think the hobbits harbor any serious hatred for anyone. They wouldn't want it, if they could avoid it. I think the power of Tolkien's world come from the accuracy from which his narrative accurately reflects the living centers of drive and consciousness within living being and the dynamics of the interplay between individuals and different groups of beings as they overlap in the world. In this reflection, he captures the genuine picture of people and societies that have risen and strive to rise above selfish impulses. The heart of his book, I think, is the wholesomeness represented by Hobbits and their way of life that is this feeling in it's healthiest state, that to me, feels superior than any other feeling or community present in Middle Earth in it's inherent Goodness. This sentiment is shared by many characters and communities throughout Middle Earth, this awareness of the greater living feeling of the World. Gandalf loves the Shire, and Aragorn and the Dunedein protect it, because it is an embodiment of the One living life that is the World and is of the World. The Elves seek most to expand the Order of and behind the World, Gandalf to protect it, Men are greatly driven to Order, yet also to impulsive selfishness, as is their and Isuldor's Bane. The Dwarves love Order, yet for their own designs, and also succumb to wickedness, yet perhaps less than Men. Sauron is obviously the perversion of the merit of Order and the ignorance of the reality and wisdom of the One living feeling of the World and of the Law and Order that protect it. 

Seemingly against all odds, goodness prevails over evil, perversion and malice. By all appearances the most weak, defeat the most Mighty. It takes a Wizard to know the difference, between true power, true ability, and the apparent power and ability of the Mighty that ultimately comes to nothing. The Lord of the Rings are born from an English soldier facing the Abyss of Evil as it threatens the Order of his World and the balance of life that sustains it. He writes of the dynamics of Power as well as the wisdom that it takes to both see what is good and to walk down the Road that is in line with it. Hobbits it seems, most love their comforts and their good life, but are least attached to them, willing to give it all up to do what is right and just, both because it is Good and because they are wise and see the Way clearly knowing what can, and what can't be avoided. Beyond the appearances of the World lies the Way or the Road as Tolkien puts it, and beyond the Road at it's very core is Emptiness and it's Wisdom of Non-attachment, the greatest light of them all.