No one, however much they possess or have achieved, is worth more than anyone else. But there is one thing that can make an enormous difference between people: their disposition. Those who make sacred the moments they share with others have a disposition towards light, and their interactions therefore have a very different quality.
Sometimes it is simply the attention they are able to give; other times, small gestures that go almost unnoticed by the eye, but never by the heart. These people are so open that they can reach into your heart and your thoughts. And why would they want to do such a thing?
To gladly give you what you long for.
They may have achieved nothing remarkable in the eyes of the world, but they have undoubtedly attained something far more important and valuable than all the absurdities revered by those with a dagger in their side: the ability to see beyond their own noses. Beyond themselves.
Those who achieve this can extend happiness and, having extended it, can see and experience it before them and within them. For as without, so within. They can create a wonderful sphere of light in which happiness flies under a shared banner. I certainly do not believe in happiness cut short. I believe in the happiness that Is because it has been able to give itself. And yes, to do this, we must have come a long way and learned a great deal. Above all, learned to love what we ourselves Are. Learned to accept ourselves as we Are.
The Love we have not given ourselves cannot be given or extended into infinity. True empathy is the willingness to be One with another: not with their suffering, which will not truly help them, but with the solution that can fill the chasm in their chest and keep them from tumbling into it.
The ability to be happy lies in continually practising attention, giving, and integration. It is a constant eureka. It is fascination with what unfolds, one moment after another.
Those who cannot pay attention cannot be happy.
Those who, out of pitiful cowardice, cannot give cannot be happy.
And what about integration? Once something has been fully given, it has been fully integrated. Giving and receiving are simultaneous.
Lack of attention prevents you from seeing.
Self-centredness prevents you from seeing.
Preconceived ideas prevent you from seeing.
To Give, you must first have seen, for those who do not See have nothing to Give. To See, you must be fully attentive, with an open heart.
To be awake is to sustain heightened states of attention and perception. The opposite is drowsiness. The opposite is the sad, inconsolable blindness of someone lamenting in their dreams.
See and Give, Give and See, and happy at last you will be.
You cannot awaken without it.
You cannot rediscover yourself without it.
You cannot find yourself again without it,
for happiness and Truth are eternally One,
and wherever One is,
the Other must also be.