All the troubles, all the quarrels and so-called “annoyances”, I like to think have shaped me and brought me closer to enlightenment.

The more I read about Zen Buddhism, the more I come to feel that enlightenment is never a thing you reach but rather a kind of direction you keep moving towards.

It will always be necessary to sit and be silent and let your thoughts come and go.

For Hegel, it’s foolish to think of Mind as something particular, because Mind is Spirit and Spirit is universal.

So whatever there is to love in myself and in those “close” to me, I can find in everyone else too.

So the only rational way to be is to love everybody and everything.

(This isn’t quite what Hegel says but I’m reading between the lines.)

Even the Earth, the solid Earth, is as fragile as a flower in the fullness of time and space. Why focus your love on one thing, or person, or truth? All things come and go, but the coming and going are forever.