In a City of Fallen Angels

In the Gospel of Thomas, Jesus is asked by his disciples, “When will heaven come?” He replies, “It won’t come by waiting for it, because Heaven is spread out upon the earth but people don’t see it.” A color blind person wouldn’t know a street made of gold if it smacked him in the face. He might even think he is trapped in a city consisting of nothing but poverty and desperation where any brutal act could be justified as a survival tactic. Such people can't see heaven. They see hell and project their horrific hallucination onto this miraculous blank canvas of pure potentiality we call existence and through reactions and attitudes paint something resembling Edvard Munch's Scream over Monet's Water Lilies.

Instead of making lemonade out of lemons they make spitoons from the pots of gold that bookend the rainbow. This is how hell is born of our own blindness. True, the streets of our earthly heaven may not literally be paved with gold but they are strewn with gold-colored leaves, golden late afternoon light, gold-eyed cats, golden-haired women, golden delicious apples and golden-hued souls shining all around. The real heaven's gold is warm and alive not cold and metallic.

A little skill. a little gratitude, a little mindfulness practice and a little emotional discipline and the world becomes a thinly-veiled paradise. And not only is she gorgeous, she's easy. She's head-over-heals for us. And so for the lowly poet she'll drops her veils at the drop of a hat. You see, the trouble with this heaven of ours is that the real God is no segregationist. He doesn't bus the the confused, needy, mean-spirited people to some project called Purgatory. Those projects were leveled long ago to make way for the ever-expanding urban renewal project of our universe.

The trouble is this heaven of ours isn't a gated community for saints and angels only. God has a very big heart. He'll let anyone in. Even you and me. You don't have to be a Buddha. You only have to have the potential to be one. So if we want to clean up the neighborhood we have to develop our Buddha nature by nurturing the development of other Buddhas. It's up to us. We live in heaven but we need to learn to see through the hell in our heads to realize it.

So one of the most fundamental purposes of our existence in this heaven is to remove the scales from our own and others eyes, not an easy task in a place where fear and hatred are so vigorously promoted in order to divide and conquer. One of our most fundamental purposes in this man-made world of illusion, mind-made world of doubt is to dispel the darkness by practicing optimism, cheer, open-hearted affection— no matter how out of vogue it may seem. Be happy anyway. Celebrate anyway. Be generous anyway. Sing anyway. Expect a miracle anyway.

Sure some people may think you’re crazy but like Zorba the Greek said, "A man needs a little madness or he never cuts the rope and is free." Practice the high art of happiness. Practice, practice, practice. Because practice makes perfection.