the reality of desire
Our desires seem innocent, don’t they? Some ice cream. A bigger house. A new smartphone. Why not? It’s true that, inherently, there is nothing wrong with desire. We wish ourselves happiness. We wish ourselves well.
So why does it feel at times that I can’t ever get enough, no satisfaction, always a new desire pulling me forward? Why does the pursuit of happiness seem never-ending, even exhausting?
“It is not desire that is wrong, but its narrowness and smallness. Desire is devotion. By all means be devoted to the real, the infinite, the eternal heart of being,” says the sage Nisargadatta Maharaj.
Does Maharaj suggest that we take a good look at the shape of our ordinary desires? Well, yes, I think so.
You could say that desire has a shape of tension, like a poised arrow. I am here; I want something out there. Fulfillment of the desire could thus be seen as the collapse of this tension: the arrow has hit its target. But, since I believe I am localized within a body, right here, a fragment in an enormous universe, a new object, out there, will inevitably arise and begin to pull me toward it again. New tension.
Might it be possible then that perhaps the dissolution of tension (relief, temporary happiness, a short fulfillment) has nothing to do with the actual content of the object? Might it be possible that the short-lived happiness I experience when the arrow lands is simply the merging of object and subject, an experience of un-fragmented wholeness?
If so, what I really want when I desire, is wholeness. The experience of totality. The experience of one undivided reality. The absence of tension. “Be devoted to the real,” Maharaj says. Be devoted to reality. Reality plays the game of tension, but is itself not tense.
Consider this: Might it be possible that when a desire is fulfilled and I experience wholeness, lack of tension, I experience in fact my true nature, this very reality? If so, I do not need the intermediary of an object to feel whole, to be, happy, fulfilled. It is already so. It is already the case.
Tension can be fun. Nothing wrong with desire. Tension can come from play and joy. But we do not need it to be happy. We are. Already. Knowing happiness.
It’s as if, upon hearing the word desire, feeling the stirring of desire...we fall in love. Not with objects. It’s more like: Love calling out in and for Love.
This is the desire for Reality that the wise ones speak of. We can be devoted to the real. Maharaj continues: "Deny your self nothing--give yourself infinity and eternity and discover that you do not need them; you are beyond.”
By the way: The word desire derives from the Latin de sidere - from the stars. We believe we are removed from the stars. We try to reach them again. We have forgotten, we are that stardust. What is here when I stop trying to arrive there? What is here, so close that I do not notice? What is here prior to desire, here where the stars and us are one and the same?
