I said to the wanting-creature inside me:

What is this river you want to cross?

There are no travelers on the river-road, and no road.

Do you see anyone moving about on that bank, or resting?

There is no river at all, and no boat, and no boatman.

There is no towrope either, and no one to pull it.

There is no ground, no sky, no time, no bank, no ford!

 

And there is no body, and no mind!

Do you believe there is some place that will make the soul less thirsty?

In that great absence you will find nothing.

 

Be strong then, and enter into your own body;

there you have a solid place for your feet.

Think about it carefully!

Don’t go off somewhere else!

 

Kabir says this: just throw away all thoughts of imaginary things,

and stand firm in that which you are.

 

Who is this wanting creature inside me? If we can answer Kabir’s question, we will have no more questions. I like his naming of “the wanting creature” and the fact that he makes no difference between the material wanting of food, riches, sex and the spiritual wanting for mystical experiences and enlightenment.  

In both cases, there is the desire to possess, to achieve, to have – all actions of the “I” or ego. It is the I who seeks to dominate and control; the I who wants to find God and become enlightened.

Where is this I to be found, then? In the mind whose thoughts are all imaginary. there is no crossing of the Great Water, no Road, or Other Side. The mind misses the Truth found in the experience of life itself.  Just stand firm in what you are, he exhorts. What we are begins with throwing away thought and desire.

KABIR was a 15 century Indian mystic poet and saint. He said that Truth is with the person who considers all creatures on earth as his own self and who is detached from the affairs of the world. To know Truth drop the “I” or ego.