For many years
I searched for wisdom.
I read endless books,
asked many wise teachers
took more courses than I can remember.
I turned to my father, my mother, my brothers, my sister.
I gathered friends and colleagues.
“Do you have wisdom?”
I asked of the sages, the philosophers, the saints.
“Can I have a piece of what you have?”
I begged of the writers, the teachers, the bloggers.
I gathered it all like a desperate hoarder,
clutching at pieces of whatever I could find.
Praying they wouldn’t slip away
like bugs scampering away from an overturned rock.
And like a harvester,
I winnowed and sifted the good from the bad.
I turned to the wilderness,
and for long days I searched there,
among the trees, the frogs, the rocks,
“Is wisdom stored in you?”
I asked them all.
“Come sit with me,” said the rock.
“Just sit. Stop searching and rest for awhile.”
“But I have work to do,” said I. “Wisdom still needs to be found.”
“Sitting helps,” said the frog. “Just try it.”
And so I tried to sit.
But my body was restless, yearning to move.
To turn over one more rock, to beg of one more sage.
My mind ached at all that I was missing.
“There’s a book I haven’t read!” I cried.
“I must go!”
My heart cried out for more conversation.
“There’s a sage I haven’t talked to! Surely she will know the way!”
The tree sighed.
“Sit,” she said. “Rest from your endless gathering.”
And so I sat.
And sat.
And sat.
And waited.
And prayed.
I tried to get up again and again, to carry on with the search.
But the rocks, trees, frogs, and rivers pleaded with me.
“Sit.”
And slowly, with the morning sun poking over the horizon,
wisdom appeared where I’d forgotten to look for it.
Deep in the places God had buried it so deep I didn’t think to look.
In my mind, my soul, my heart, my body.
Wisdom was there all along.