"Joy without Condition"

The adage that asserts the best journeys are the ones that bring us home is a good way to evaluate a spiritual practice.  Like the prodigal son, and Jesus in the wilderness, everyone is tempted to find fulfillment through a promise of greener grass somewhere out there beyond the current moment and circumstance.  We have all taken those journeys away from home, literally and figuratively, because we are highly motivated to find happiness.  It is the soul's mandate for life: experience all the peace, love and joy that is possible.    We learn as we take enough of these journeys, whether in mind, body or spirit, that the way home to fulfillment is always a reverse of what ordinary sense tells us.   The search for love bears this out when we find through experience that love comes to us most profoundly, not when we are loved, but when we love.  This apparent reversal of logic is the hallmark of all profound spiritual insights.  What we seek is not out there, but within us as inherent qualities, that seek a way out.   The experience of deep joy is no exception.  We've all been tripped up by playing the conditional joy card that would seem the sure bet to happiness. That's the belief that joy is an effect of getting what we want. But the hand of truth inevitably trumps that illusion and reveals the weakness of that play. It is of course so tempting to continue to play with trick or treat dualism because the fallacy is so well masked by a conditional world. But by grace, joy resides within us, however deeply embedded beneath our expectations for a better life. Of course, all of us find ourselves at times (lately for me) saying "if this or that would happen, then I would feel happier!"  There is no end to the list of circumstances, preferences, needs, or wants that our ego minds will decide are the prerequisites for our joy.   It's an easy trap to fall into for us humans and clearly it a journey that will not bring us home.   The truth is in the reversal.  All of those stories about what keeps us from our joy are lies.  Nothing can keep us from our essential wholeness; the love, peace and joy that are deep within us.  No matter how we are tempted to play it, the end game demands trust in the goodness of Life, whether the appearances support our faith or not.  Hang in there long enough, and deep enough with your faith in the goodness of God, and your journey will bring you home, sweet home.