Harry Potter

I went to Willcox to see the new Harry Potter Movie tonight. The final one (gasp). It was four dollar movie night. The theater is called the Rex Allen Theater, named after the man himself. I've never seen a Rex Allen movie but my parents did. I like the theater because it's run by a family and it feels like a family affair; kids and babies and such. They use real butter on the popcorn and pop it fresh. Most mega-plex's buy bags of pre-made popcorn and put it in the machine to make it look like it was popped there. This is what I was told at the Rex Allen. The movie was great. To me, it was all about love, and fear, fear and love. I thought about how I've been feeling that all the bells and whistles of this lineage of Buddhism I am in, are only that, bells and whistles. Props to keep you interested and engaged. They're great, don't get me wrong. They are needed for many people for many reasons. It's skillful means. I need them. But the heart of the lineage and of the path is love. You have to love everyone. You especially have to love your worst enemy, and he is inside you. Harry found this out tonight. Part of Voldemort's soul was living inside him. They were connected and Harry had to die himself in order to kill Voldemort, or at least a part of Voldemort. Harry had to be willing to die in order to be free of and to free the world of, their worst fear. Oh it was beautiful. Such a rich story. Such a skillful metaphor.

I remember something my teacher heard His Holiness the Dalai Lama say to a group of monks once. I'm paraphrasing here, but it was something like, 'Good looking, ugly, thin, fat, Love them all!' There is no way around it. We have to learn to love everyone. Especially the ones most difficult to love. They're the ones who can set us free. That's why it's so hard to wake up, to awaken. The key has been hidden in plain sight and it is the place we least want to go. We don't want to see that everyone IS me and that's why I have to love them. I don't want to see that. I don't want the little 'me' to die. I want to be different from other people. That's how I mostly act. I think, however, that there is a world of unimaginable clarity and freedom if one can see that there is not a difference. It can seem like magic, wand waving and all that. What would it be like to walk in the world without fear and in it's place with Love? I think it would be like really living.