so much more than a body

i just came back from a weekend trip and im really tempted to post about it but i am so so so tired that im choosing, instead, to do the easy thing and just copy/paste something short and beautiful that I've come across..

enjoy the food for thought..

"The soul of man is like a piece of crystal,

but it takes the color of whatever is near it.

Whatever the soul touches... it has to take its color.

That is the difficulty.

That constitutes bondage.

The color is so strong,

the crystal forgets itself and identifies itself with the color.

Suppose a red flower is near the crystal:

the crystal takes the color and forgets itself, thinks it is red.

We have taken the color of the body and have forgotten what we are.

All the difficulties that follow come from that one dead body.

All our fears, all worries, anxieties, troubles, mistakes, weakness, evil,

are from that one great blunder-- that we are bodies.

This is the ordinary person.

It is the person taking the color of the flower near to it.

We are no more bodies than the crystal is the red flower."
- Vivekananda