The shame, so familiar, creeps into my soul. It whispers lies to me. It speaks of destined failure and hopeless causes. It leads me into well-worn paths of self-sabotage and self-loathing. It tells me that these are the paths I am meant to walk. When I object to this, it tells me that these are the only paths there are. It lies. The shame is not even real. It comes from dead voices of the past…voices that have taken up lodging in my brain, acting as though they are my real conscience, putting on clothes and pretending to be the boss. They march around the vulnerable places of my mind, shouting about how there is dust here and dirt there and defunct corridors everywhere. These empty voices start rummaging through the files of my memories, pointing with shock at what is written on some, laughing in derision at others, scoffing at choices I made. They take the files of mistakes and parade them around my mind, announcing to all of my thoughts how serious and grave and destructive these files are.

These voices, who feign responsibility, muster gatherings in the town square of my mind, inciting rebellion against the master of the brain. They criticize how I run shop. They tear apart my values, claiming they are nothing more than fanciful wishes of selfishness and naiveté. They question my authority to retain the agency of myself. They request that others be in charge and that I just lock myself in some old house in a dark alley so I won’t get myself into trouble anymore. They drone on and on about how better management…their management…would finally clean up the streets and eliminate imperfect records and just get rid of ‘all the nonsense.’

They hate me. Oh, they claim to be doing all of this for my own good, yet no good has ever come of what they preach. Theirs is a religion of perfectionism, pride, and fear.

My mind isn’t perfect. There is some dust and some cracks and some dead-ends. There are sections that don’t work properly. There are indeed files recording my mistakes and weaknesses. 

But there are also glorious halls draped in golden-green ivy where the sounds of a thousand waterfalls echo in the chambers, and laughter can always be heard. The voices stand outside the walls of these places, shouting about how frivolous it all is, but they fear to go inside. There are valleys painted with flowers of 6 dozen different colors, where children and adults frolic together in peace and frivolity. There are majestic mountains that reach for heights yet unimagined, where strength and solidity and confidence are ever unchanging.

But above and beside and below and within all of these places of my mind, there is a deeper, realer place from which it all stems. Here there is peace that is quieter than pure silence and being that is older than the universe. There is a never-ending fountain, which never began, from which cascades endless ideas that shall never cease. This place is me and it is not defined by either the grandeur or the imperfections of my mind. It is undefinable, inexpressible and forever uniquely me. I need not fear this place, for what greater despair is there than to fear oneself? This is my place of solitude. The old, twisted voices cannot come here. They do not even know how to begin to come here. This is a place that would destroy their existence should they attempt to come, for it is a real place…and they are unreal. 

In fact, they are just shadows of the imperfect corridors of my mind. They are creations of my fears and insecurities from the world above my being. From the never-ending fountain, I can wash my mind of all these voices and imperfections, and I can will the further blossoming of the grand halls and serene valleys and awesome mountains. For though no one can come into my being where I dwell in perfect safety, I can invite all to come into the places that I create where there is only appreciation and sharing and fulfillment and honesty. And as long as I choose to create that which stems from the real me, what I create will then one day awaken, just as the wooden boy wished, and be adopted into being where all things become real forever more. And love for myself and others will be the most real thing there ever was.