The mustard seed

Not for the first time(and unfortunately not for the last time), I wanted an assignment at work and lost it to a competitive ‘teammate’. The assignment should have been rightfully mine but I wasn’t savvy enough to establish my territory before my ‘teammate’ came on board. As I stayed open to my disappointment and feelings of loss, something amazing happened. Rather than feel desire is something I must transcend, I felt the poignancy of desire and the inevitability of disappointment. I felt connected to everyone. To all those who have wanted something and lost, I know how you feel. It is one thing to read about these things; another to think these thoughts; but entirely different and infinitely richer to feel it. I was sitting at my hairdresser's, after days of inner anguish over this matter, listening to someone talk about how he saw a good deal on a car and sent his wife over to get it and hoped she got it. I hoped too. Another hoped his Dad would give up smoking. I hoped too. Previously, I would have perhaps failed to be empathize with people wanting cars for instance since I did not want ‘material’ things. But having embarked on a journey of self-expression at work where it is OK to go and want something, I am learning and re-learning that the object of the want is immaterial. There is something poignant and universal in the wanting itself. And someday even if by some miracle, the adult in me ends up ‘transcending’ its wants, the child in me will continue wanting and continue getting disappointed, and peace comes from hugging and consoling a crying child and not by preaching sermons to it.
In the meanwhile, I am reminded about something I read about life being an advanced degree in loss. This is not very cheerful. But it is a fact. And a universal fact. And for me alleviation of suffering comes not from transcending it but realizing the universality of hope and disappointment over and over again. And that is where the mustard seed comes in.