hot boulder

I am standing by a boulder, a vast boulder, in the boulder fields of Hampi, in India. Across the valley, I hear temple music playing, and nearby there are birds chattering. The sun has just set and the air is beginning to cool already. But this big boulder has been sitting in the sun all day, and standing near it, I feel the heat radiating out from it. Feeling this heat, my body relaxes a little. Ahh. The muscles soak up the warmth, as they would in a warm bath.

And feeling this heat emanating from this rock, it somehow reminds me of our buddha nature. It's as if that essence within us has been sitting in the sun forever. And when we come close to it, when we allow our busy, preoccupied little mind to quieten for a while, when we bring our awareness inside, deep within us, then we begin to feel the warmth of our buddha nature. It's radiating that warmth all the time. Yet much of the time we are unaware of it. It's only when we find those quiet moments, and remember who we really are, then do we feel it, the vastness of the buddha nature, as big as this boulder, and bigger still, and radiating a warmth that allows us to relax: physically, mentally, emotionally.

So I give thanks for this warm boulder, for reminding me that deep inside I too have a reservoir of warmth: the buddha nature, my essence.