I’m about to leave Portland, and like every place I go, I love it. I love it on sight. I love it without effort. I love it simply because I’m here, and because Portland is too. It reminds me that I love my life every time I actually step foot into it.
When I drove to LAX on Friday morning under clouds and drizzle I thought to myself, This reminds me of Portland. When I got to the Portland airport that afternoon I thought to myself, This reminds me of Milwaukee or Denver. On the windy waterfront later having clam chowder I thought, This reminds me of Boston or San Francisco. At the little church where I spoke I thought This reminds me of Minnesota or Scottsdale. Some women walked in and I recognized them, and they reminded me where we had last met. Seattle.
The real world is like this, when you meet it face to face. It always reminds you that you’re home.
I like to sum things up as simply as possible, so when I give a talk, I say, “Everything I say, the whole point of the teaching, the only reason I’m here is to get you to come here.” Then I stick my index finger out and curl it toward me, “Come here!” And by that I mean come out of the confines of your head and all those thoughts that tell you what you can’t do or where you can’t go and come into the bright wide open field before you. “Make yourself at home here,” I say, “in your life.”
But today I see that’s only half of it. The whole point of the teaching is to get me to come out, to step forward, to keep going, so I can meet you and love you on sight, without effort. Because there’s no place like home, and no place that isn’t already home.
Thank you, all of you, for always encouraging me in my practice.
Ah and Oh…. this is so beautiful! I don’t know how you álways manage to write the right words to me (and all your other readers of course). But this
“come out of the confines of your head” is a lesson I very much needed to hear today.
Thank you for sticking your index finger out and curling it, I can feel it even though you are miles away!
Comment by Roos — October 17, 2010 @ 5:37 pm
Maezen–
What a lovely thing!
Come here, anytime.
And specifically, come back to Portland sometime when I can come there to meet you!
Comment by Beth Patterson — October 18, 2010 @ 12:24 am
Thank you for these words, Karen. I hope I can also meet you in person, sometime soon, as I feel that I already have met you.
Comment by Ines — October 18, 2010 @ 6:14 pm
Oh I so wish I could have come to see you. So close yet so far away. Alas I had to work. One of these days …
Comment by Shalet — October 18, 2010 @ 6:53 pm
How fabulous are you. I’m so grateful my path travels along your path. Thank you, Maezen for opening my mind, my eyes and my life.
Comment by denise — October 19, 2010 @ 12:40 am
These words brought tears to my eyes.
Thank you.
Comment by Els — October 19, 2010 @ 9:22 am
Isn’t it said that ‘we teach to learn?’
Comment by Deborah — October 19, 2010 @ 8:29 pm
Inseparably, Deborah. Inseparably.
Comment by Karen Maezen Miller — October 19, 2010 @ 8:35 pm
As I sat in the front row at your talk in Portland last Friday night, I felt so at home. And your words, such true reminders of what I so often forget. Thank you so much for coming to Portland and reminding me. I am so grateful!
Comment by Angie — October 21, 2010 @ 3:09 am
Beautiful.
Comment by Jane — October 28, 2010 @ 11:49 pm