When I was 13 years old, a war arrived on my doorstep. Out of the blue, who would have thought it. There I was in a kind of paradise, the sun hot on my skin, playing with dolls, basking in the success of my school grades … if a little bored, as an only child. And in a moment, the world changed. Bombs that scared the life out of me, killer planes screeching in the dark of night, paratroopers landing on the roof of our home. I lost my voice, I lost my ground, I lost my ability to eat or drink or pee. Eventually I lost my dolls, my school grades, my clothes, and my home. And my parents were lost in their own trauma. I froze. And remained frozen for a very long time. It never left me, this knowing that life was uncertain. For many years, this traumatized state would have me jump out of my skin at any unexpected noise. Even a loud voice would result in a visceral freeze.
It's not like that any more. Now there is only a happening in the open awareness that is here. Now there is the totality being experienced in this singularity. Now there is no-one here who stands outside of anything, there are no bad things happening to me ... because the whole of existence is inside me. There is no longer a me, but only the "I" that is the "eye" of the storm. It is both the center and it is without any center. It is everywhere and nowhere. It is free, falling into the infinite and untethered by time.
Whatever the storm, we are each called to hold the line, to remain true to an unconditioned awareness. It’s an inner stillness, an inner space that is untainted by the matrix of fear.
In the midst of immense turbulence — the turbulence of our emotions and thoughts that are triggered by the turbulence of world events — there is a necessity to remain unshakable. This inner line is not a hard position, not a stance of opinion nor a stance of defense or attack … but an invisible yet invincible knowing of being-ness, that which underpins all appearances and circumstances. You could call it presence. A deep intimacy with core of being, untainted and unobscured by anything the mind can conjure. Not running into an imagination of a future moment, but totally here.
This is the call of the true spiritual warrior. I would even say, it is the call of the true human warrior. To hold the line is to not give in to the archaic mechanism of panic and drama, of fear and victimhood. To hold the line is the most noble action you can take. It’s an action deep in you. And so it is totally up to you, no-one can command you … you are your own captain, your own teacher, your own creator. And yet this cannot be done by the ego-self. It can only be known by that which is free of division.
It is the same line held by Christ on the cross, when he became the light of the world. My friend, you and I ... we each hold the light of the world within us. You and I ... we can end the war right here. My friend, let's hold the line together ... because right here, we are never separate. Right here, we are one Being. Right here is where it starts and ends.