Now

That sadness there in your chest,
that doubt in your heart,
that sigh of disillusionment,
doesn’t make you less perfect,
less spiritual, or less profound.
It makes you human.

The goal never was happiness.
Happiness is an experience,
like anger, grief, and uncertainty.
It was never a place of permanence.

If we stop chasing happiness
like a dog chasing its tail,
And give space for what actually is—
whatever that state may be—
what actually is will relax from the contracted grip of resistance and open up,
reveal itself into our understanding, 
our wisdom.

May we stop the madness of
chasing ourselves out of the
Now that is our salvation.
Right Now is the teacher, the guide, the spiritual adviser, the priest.
Surrender to it.

Make room for the feelings
in your gut, in your chest.
Make contact with the sensations
that are there.
Be that courageous.

In silence, in stillness,
without analysis or explanation,
just let it be.
Breathe into it.
Cry with it.
It never wasn’t perfect,
and it is the key to our salvation.

Now is all that will ever exist.
Put the past and future aside,
and be the same stuff that
birthed Eternity.
Be the same sacred stuff
that burns the sun,
hurls stars through space,
and swallows galaxies.

Birth and destruction are inherent within us.
We are that Mystery.
Only by allowing what is Now,
allowing all of it
with open-hearted invitation and vulnerability,
will that joy you seek flourish from the compost
of your terrain.

~Molly Kate Brown