At Home In the Universe

 All of us want, in some form or another, to feel at home in the universe. What does that mean? What, exactly, does “home” mean? Sometimes we need to create our own homes in our imagination when the outside world is not hospitable. This does not mean that we should go into a kind of withdrawal from the world but, rather, we need to get a sense of what home means to us.

If we take a certain place as “our home”, we are bound to feel insecure about it. A home is an investment that fluctuates and even loses its value over time due to the reality of decay and even depreciation. When we become so attached to the comfort of sitting in one place, being in charge of a particular domain called “my room”, “my office”, or “my space”, we are bound to create an opposition in our mind and start to reject anything that doesn’t fall into the category of home. That is why the form of home is only one step away from a sense of clinging and attachment. In fact, we can say similar things about all of our possessions, whether they’re tangible or intangible.

Home comes from letting go and being present with whatever is. Even when things are super unpleasant, we need to realize we are only in a dream. The conditions around us are continually changing, and what we frame to be “tragedy” is actually just a temporary experience that is going to disappear or change into something else eventually. So the “home” is the stillness—the awareness that we are using here and now, to contemplate all of our experiences as they are arising and changing over time.

Clinging to our possessions is only the first layer that comes from attachment to the physical. Mental formations can also turn into attachments. When we pick up thoughts, we think they are “ours” or “mine”. Then we create an opposition in our minds, like “this is my thought” and “You can’t change my mind”. Thus, we confuse the thoughts as being inseparable from our mind or our identity. We even create pressure and resistance when we imagine that there is “my” thought and “someone else’s” thought. In fact, all thoughts are the result of arising causes and conditions. They all happen in the present moment and are experienced by the same mind. That mind is not divided into “I” and “You”, “this” or “that”. When we are bringing our awareness back to this fundamental mind that sees, feels, hears, tastes, touches, etc., we find our true home. That home is not swayed by the coming and goings of phenomena, and as a result, does not experience the pressure of trying to be one thing or another. The pressure becomes nothing more than an illusion stemming from discrimination of “I” and “not-I”.

We need to feel at home within ourselves by letting go of everything: mine, yours, emotions, thoughts. When there is too much of an attachment to a center, we tend to push anything that isn’t this “center” into the periphery, like a spiral galaxy of the mind. It’s not necessary to even discriminate between likes and dislikes, when they are only passing forms. The ice cream we find tasty just melts in our tongue. The money we cherish is used to buy things that are ultimately perishable. What we achieved yesterday is already passed. So with this attitude, we have to find a home in our present moment, which does not depend on the shifting conditions.

I think that for myself, being at home in the world (and in myself) entails the following qualities:

·         A sense of interiority that is not encroached upon by the outside world. There needs to be a part of me that feels a bit separate, a kind of sanctuary where I can go to when I don’t want to respond to anyone or am not in the mood to engage with others or the outside world.

·         A sense of “everything is ok”. This dovetails with the theme of acceptance. A feeling that, no matter what, things will turn out for the best, the world is basically friendly, and one doesn’t necessarily need to be in total control of the unfolding situation. This also entails an attitude of letting go, and allowing the causes and conditions to unfold naturally.

·         Ability to inhabit one’s emotions, even when they are not socially acceptable. Apathy, exhaustion—these are the kinds of emotions that we all feel from time to time and we need to make space for them even when they are unpleasant or point to not so pleasant realities

·         A sense that everything is impermanent. This is to say that all situations have their own natural unfolding

Can we find a home within our mind? Is this mind what we see? Is it this body, these hands that I use to type these words, or even the words themselves? We need to inquire into this.