We all have the power to transcend our circumstances, and become our sovereign selves. He wanted us to know that.

When the Buddha said “The way is not in the sky. The way is in the heart,” he was encouraging us to see that there is nothing outside us worthy of understanding. The lesson - the kingdom - lay within us.

The world, then, had nothing for me. For many years I thought it did. I derived my sense of worth from how I managed what happened in my world.

What I thought of as “the world,” however, was actually just a series of events and circumstances. Ironically, they were someone else’s as often as they were mine.

How could I possibly define myself by what had little or nothing to do with me? And even if it did have something to do with me, “it” simply kept happening. And kept changing.

And yet...amid continual change, here I was, still breathing.

With guidance, I saw that circumstances could not define nor understand me any better than I could myself.

I saw that the experience I was trying to have was the one I was already having.

Whenever my circumstances changed, instead of asking “Is this me?” I began to ask “Am I me?”

And it became ever more important that the answer be yes. Always yes. It was only fair. I had been the only one there for all of it.

I am all that needs to be understood. I am also the understanding.

I am the way. I am the truth. I am the life.

The path to understanding is me.

*Photo credit: Michael Sendbuehler