As I lay in bed, trying to fall asleep, a sentence popped into my head: “Wherever you go, you take yourself with you.” Someone with whom I shared that sentence said that it’s funny if taken literally, but of course its real meaning is metaphorical. Many people who are unhappy dream of just picking up stakes and going elsewhere and starting brand new lives–starting all over again. Some actually try to do it. Of course, it never works. Some part of unhappiness arises from a person’s own flaws, and, wherever she goes, she takes those flaws with her, causing the same sorts of problems as made her unhappy elsewhere.
I’ve spent nearly a lifetime running away and trying to start over. It never worked for me. Getting rid of my computer was yet another attempt to change my life and eke out some happiness by changing external circumstances. It was a total failure. So I’m done running. I’m going to try accepting that I just am the way I am, and I shall still be me no matter where I go or what I change about the world immediately outside me.
“Sorrow lies in the house,” said Buddha, so he left the house. But those of us who are not Buddha have to accept that the house is our own skin, and there’s no leaving it. So here I stay, dun runnin. And in staying I find a new burst of serenity that will last as long as it lasts.