In what areas of your life do you want to learn more?

Actually, I want to learn less. Or maybe I want to learn to want to learn less. It's outside knowledge, intellectual knowledge I want to learn less of, so that it interferes less with the inner knowing (not knowledge) that is already there, that makes itself known in the silent, listening moments. I guess what I really want is to learn to trust enough to live from the inside out, rather from the outside in, and to live that way all the time, not just some of the time. Outside-in living has so many limitations; it's trying to fit a world of perceptual illusion into a world of pure being. Inside-out living works every time. It's pure, authentic living. It's real. Real-to-real living. It opens up a universe of possibilities.

There was a time when I thought if only I could learn enough about my past, about my heritage, then I'd know who I was. Then I'd be ready to start living. But it's really the other way around, isn't it? When I can leave my past behind me, or accept it, integrate it without having to know every detail; when I can shake off all the illusions---mine, those of my family and my people---and all the expectations of who I'm supposed to be in the world; when I can give up having to figure it all out; when can I give up the need to intellectualize everything; then I am free to start living. But it's a different kind of living. It's not goal-oriented, it's not overly planned, it's not rigid. What it is, is balanced.