Saturday, August 13, 2005

Seek ye first

Recently I was attending a lecture by a spiritual teacher who several times addressed us as "seekers." While I did not take violent exception to the classification, I felt somewhat uncomfortable with it. In truth, I don't think in my life I've ever felt much like a seeker; I prefer the word "explorer." The difference is this. If I am seeking, it means I am looking for something and I probably have some idea of what I'm looking for. As an explorer, I know I am in unknown territory, and though I will do a lot of looking around, and make discoveries in the process, I cannot predict in advance what they will be, or even what category they will be in. I may think I am looking for a new shape of cloud and discover instead a hedgehog.

Even before I seek the kingdom of heaven, I will explore the world without and within, because that is where I find myself, and perhaps I will stumble upon heaven in the process. Anyway, they just might have stuck it in a place you wouldn't ordinarily look.

2 comments:

Tom said...

The Seekers. A very fine Australian folk/pop group. Check out "Georgy Girl". Very good track.

Doug Mackey said...

I should have quoted The Who song:

I'm looking for me!
You're looking for you!
We're looking at each other
And we don't know what to do!

They call me the Seeker
I've been searching low and high
I won't get to get what I'm after
Till the day I die