Imagine this...After years of struggling with your weight, you are frustrated with your life and unsure of where to go next. Having tried everything else you can think of, you have decided to become a spiritual disciple, dropping your smaller troubles to seek ultimate truth. You want to know your true nature, maybe even find the Buddha mind. Certainly you want to stop suffering so much.

So you take a leave of absence from your job, pack your bags, and head off to a mountainside monastery somewhere in Japan, or Thailand, or maybe Korea. You will go anywhere that may be able to provide you with a deep awakening experience.

You arrive at a set of huge, heavy monastery doors. You push your way in, and find yourself welcomed by a simple teacher who offers you a formal bow. You are led to a small room with only a bed, a nightstand, and a chair. You change your clothes to match those of the other initiates, and your old clothes—and the life they signify—are kindly taken away.

Stripped of the past, you notice it feels very clean and clear in this place. The mountainside view is breathtaking, and the crisp air seems scented with possibility. You begin to feel you might be able to find something good here.

You breathe deep, again and again, drinking in the hope that here, you will find what you are looking for. Here, you may find answers to your life troubles. Here, you may find a way to follow your deeper self—a way that your city life did not allow for.

Maybe it will be hard, and new, but maybe your mind will open. Maybe your relationship troubles, left so far behind, will find a way to work themselves out while you are gone. Maybe the simple diet will help you shed the weight, without even noticing. Maybe all you needed was this time, and space.

Others have had awakenings here, why not you?

On your first full day, you sit for a long time, learning to meditate. It is a simple process. Maybe too simple. Breathe in, breathe out. Watch your breath. When your mind wanders, bring it back to the breath. Do it again and again and again. There is nothing else to find, or so the teacher says.

Yet you came to find something. Interesting problem. Maybe there is something behind the "nothing" your teacher speaks of. You look for it, trying not to look. You wait, trying not to wait.

Despite this simple instruction, your mind is going crazy with thoughts. But the teacher has said it will settle down, in time, and with practice. You are glad you have the time.Soon, you will see your greatest teacher, the Master everyone raves about. This Master will give you something called a koan. You understand it to be a question that is impossible to answer from your sleepy, emotionally dragging, mind-cluttered life.

You know the most famous koan: "Two hands clap and there is a sound. What is the sound of one hand clapping?" Already you can think of answers, but you know they must not be right. How could they be, so soon into this process?

You wonder, what koan will be given to you? How long will it take you to get the right answer?

You meditate, trying to stay in the present moment, but the wondering about the impossible question you will be given already has you thinking. Already it is foiling your peace!

While it is confounding to you, your teacher knows that this koan is already working its magic—even before you have been given the question.

Finally, it is your time to meet the Master. You enter the Master's presence with reverence. You do everything you have been instructed to do. As the Master settles in, you can barely contain yourself.

This! This is your life question! This one question, and you can begin to solve every question behind it.

The Master smiles gently, with warm eyes. "Your koan," the Master states, "is 'Why can't I loose weight?"'

Impossible! All this way, and for what? The same small problem you live with at home? A "koan" you have already been living with? The one that caused you to seek so desperately, to come so far? Surely the Master must have something better than the silly little egoistic question you have long wrestled with.

Again the Master smiles gently, with warm eyes. The Master knows, and suddenly, so do you. The unsolvable problem that has poked you, proded you, and refused to leave you alone is, and always has been, your perfect koan.

Knowing nothing else for certain, you at least know what you must do next. You must return home, to your life, and continue to live your koan. You must find the answer to this, before any other answers can come. Yet you are not disappointed, because now you know, consciously, what you have always known deep within. Your weight loss is the perfect path for you. You have found what you were looking for.

~~~~~~

There is a saying: "Bidden or not bidden, God is present."

If this is true, then perhaps even if you never take a leave of absence to be a spiritual aspirant in a foreign country, even if you never leave your living room, your teacher is waiting with your koan.

Perhaps even before you know that your own personal koan is "Why can't I loose weight?" you are working on it. Perhaps you have been for many years. Perhaps the Master is already present, waiting for you to realize your question, and to therefore be ready to work on it more formally.

What if your city life was taken into account before you were born? What if your body, your personality, and your life circumstances came with a built-in koan? What if your personal koan was designed to reveal itself this way, since it was known that your "real world" life would not easily provide for a mountainside monestery experince?

What if this seemingly unsolvable challenge of your life (which is present in some form in each and every of the 6+ billion people living on this planet) is a part of your life for a reason? Maybe even a good reason?

This is the premise I will work from in this blog. Solve this mystery for yourself, and perhaps you will solve all others. Perhaps the True Self will be revealed. Perhaps—just perhaps—through the long journey home, you will find the crisp mountain air of possibility can be found wherever you are.