I raised to my lips a spoonful of the tea in which I had soaked a morsel of the cake. No sooner had the warm liquid, and the crumbs with it, touched my palate than a shudder ran through my whole body, and I stopped, intent upon the extraordinary changes that were taking place. An exquisite pleasure had invaded my senses, but individual, detached, with no suggestion of its origin. And at once the vicissitudes of life had become indifferent to me, its disasters innocuous, its brevity illusory – this new sensation has had on me the effect which love has of filling me with a precious essence; or rather this essence was not in me, it was myself. I had ceased not to feel mediocre, accidental, mortal.
– Marcel Proust
“I had ceased not to feel mediocre, accidental, mortal.” All from a sip of tea. When we can slow down, and notice, with great attention to detail, the mundane aspects of life, THAT is when we really live.
Finding enlightenment is not an evening of firecrackers, songs, dance and jublience. In fact when it is grand, it usually fades into the distance quickly, leaving us with a sense that something just happened…but what? Enlightenment is not something to seek, to attain, to hold on to. It is the ability to see our day to day life with wide eyes and open hearts and great love for the details, the space in between the details, and find love for yourself and all that surrounds you. Even if the moment sucks.
The essence of life is not AROUND you. It is not even IN you. It IS you.
