Bankruptcy of the Pocket or of the Soul?

I am in the midst of making a big choice. Whatever I do choose will lay out at least the next 3 months of my life, when surely I will be faced with yet another big choice. This is how it works. And when these choices present themselves, there are many ways of going in search of the answer, of which path to traverse. I have tried it all: talked to friends and family, prayer, meditation, and reading. I have found it particularly helpful to go into my many journals from the past to see what it was I was praying for before, so that I might understand why the opportunities at hand present themselves in the way that they do.

Whilst perusing my many scribbles, dreams and observations of the past few years, I came across a piece of writing a friend had shared with me. The author, Sterling Hayden, was himself a wanderer/seeker type. He had Hollywood in the palm of his hands at one point and walked away. He was in the service, he sailed...it seems as though he knew how to follow his heart, how to choose. And so as I find wisdom in his words, I share them with you:

To be truly challenging, a voyage, like a life, must rest on a firm foundation of financial unrest. Otherwise, we are doomed to a routine traverse, the kind known by yachtsmen who play with their boats at sea..."cruising" it's called. Real voyaging belongs to seamen, and to the wanderers of the world who cannot, or will not, fit in. If you are contemplating a voyage and you have the means, abandon the venture until your fortunes change. Only then will you know what the sea is all about.

"I've always wanted to sail to the seven seas, but I can't afford it." What these men can't afford , is not to go. They are enmeshed in the cancerous discipline of "security". And in the worship of security they fling their lives beneath the wheels of routine-and before they know it their lives are gone.

What does a man need-really need? A few pounds of food each day, heat and shelter, six feet to lie down in-and some form of working activity that will yield a sense of accomplishment. That's all-in the material sense, and we know it. But we are brainwashed by our economic system until we end up in a tomb beneath a pyramid of time payments, mortgages, preposterous gadgetry, playthings that divert our attention for the sheer idiocy of the charade.

The years thunder by, the dreams of youth grow dim where they lie caked in dust on the shelves of patience. Before we know it, the tomb is sealed.

Where, then, lies the answer?

In choice.

Which shall it be?

Bankruptcy of the pocket or bankruptcy of the soul?

-Sterling Hayden

Choice versus mere decision. Decisions lie in canceling certain possibilities in order to replace with something else. Choice comes from the heart. In choice there is power. If only we can listen...

Om shanti. Om peace.