The first thing to go is the spiritual condition. I hope you are convinced by now that I am not a religious wingnut. Wingnut, yes. Religious wingnut, no. The whole religion thing is a counterbalance to the whole wingnut thing. Imagine that I am a catamaran. Something out of Miami Vice or some similar type thing. I get to running full out, wind in my sails, America’s Cup ass kicking sort of action. (As in the present day, wherein I am careening toward Saturday’s big event with the spinnaker filled.) Sooner or later one of those hulls is going to lift out of the water, which is exciting but dangerous. Sure, I’m flying at this point but I could fall over at any moment. That’s when it’s good to have Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John on your crew leaning over the side to keep the thing from flipping.
As a matter of fact, this is one of those times when I can use all the help I can get, so we’ve go Mohammed and a large variety of Hindu gods on the boat, not to mention some woodland pagan bastards who were so drunk in port that they had no idea what they were getting into. It’s hard to believe that a sea town would have enough mead to get Oden good and ripped, but whatever works. Skinny Thai Buddha is here, of course, but I’m thinking we are going to need fat Chinese Buddha before this is all over with.
See, the thing is that the ship needs to stay upright for the journey to get finished. I start to get obessed with how quickly we can get there, or with achieving a certain style. These are nice goals, but in pursuit of them the spiritual condition starts to get weak. Then I start to loose patience with real people as well as spiritual entites. That’s when the emotional condition starts to blow. Now we are on a downward spiral that ends with yours truly on the couch with a crappy cupcake from SwIngles watching “South Park” and not even writing a post. Next step: penniless and insane in a 1958 singlewide with a porthole window parked in a cow pasture down by the river. Not the happy place.
So that’s why it’s a good idea for me to stay in touch with the spiritual crew. Try to keep the boat upright. They help keep the spiritual ship stable so the emotional and physical don’t go into the drink. I’ve know intellectually for a long time that it’s the spiritual condition that is fundamental to my ability to function in other areas. I’m actually kind of grateful for the current moment of stress that has given me an experience of how essential that conditioning actually is.