Most of what you're doing right now I never told you to.

I didn't ask you to.

You took it upon yourself.

I told you to seek the kingdom first, to seek me first, to ask and knock and receive it,

to look and listen until you fill it here.

I brought it here. I brought it here before you appeared here looking for it.

Turn around. Sit down.

Relax.

Let me uncomplicate everything, detangle everything, let me reorient you. Working harder won't get you there. Planning more won't get you here. You are already here or else you could not hear me. If you knew that where you sat, you sat as it, as that one, as the end and the beginning, could you allow the rest to overwhelm you,

to take the stress and pain and failure from you.

Can I take you from you and leave you completely silent inside and powerfully radiant?

Close your eyes.

And be absolutely empty.

No voice.

No voice, no voice, no inner dialogue.

It will come.

But listen to the silence instead.

Listen past this voice.

The silence is like velvet.

It tastes like honey.

It's sweet.

And you're coming to prefer it more and more.

...