September 03, 2023 – A

We find our own way,
taking our cues from 
the way life requires to be lived,
playing the "Is this me or not me?" game
from one choice to the next.

Forced choices are not choices at all,
just places where we don't get to choose
what we do about what's happening.

What to do about what's happening
is how we express/find who we are,
and where we shine,
and where we have no business being,
and what we have no business doing.

Our life is at its best 
when we are aligned
with its direction and flow,
at one with who we are
and what we are doing.

It is at its worst
when we are at the mercy
of events and circumstances
between the clashing rocks
on the heaving waves of the wine dark sea,
with nothing but forced choices
compelling us to be and do 
in ways at odds with who we are
and what we are built for.

When the accountant 
is working for rent money
behind a bar in a dive,
it is a bad day every day,
and what's to be done then?

It is the right kind of emptiness,
stillness and silence all the way.

The accountant has to find the way
back to the Tao--the flow of life--
one small step/decision at a time,
listening, looking, sensing, feeling
"Me or not me?"
With every choice that is not forced.
And being right about 
what is me and not me,
and finding out how much she/he 
can get by with 
in the time left for living.

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