Are we there yet?

Are we there yet? pesters the young child from the back seat.

Are. We. There. Yet?

But zoom out and we’re all that young child, looking to arrive, looking to get somewhere.

You can look through the telescope for the fine details but you’ll miss the grander view if you do.

If you look too hard, you’ll see only a fraction of the total picture.

If you ask the wrong question, you will never find the right answer.

You will always be looking somewhere where the answer is not.

Scrutinising things too closely under the microscope.

As Alan Watts told us…

One day you will wake up realising you’ve arrived, at whatever place you think it is you wanted to go, and feel no different than you did before.

Are we there yet? Is the wrong question.

What’s the right question? Why, of course, no question. You’re there.

You are always exactly where you are meant to be.

You are there. Because you are here.

Here is the there you’ve been looking for.

Not in this house, or this seat on the bus you’re sitting on right now.

Zoom out you fools! Look at the bigger picture and the world around you!

But we missed the point the whole way along. It was a musical thing and you were supposed to sing or to dance while the music was being played. — Alan Watts