A Bitter-Sweet Symphony

I was listening to this song recently and I realized it's a perfect metaphor for the human experience. Every person has their ups and downs, their highs and lows, their triumphs and tragedies. They taste the bitterness and the sweetness of life in varying degrees on a daily basis. But not everyone realizes that both sides of the coin are equally significant, and in a way the bad is actually a good thing if you understand why it exists in the first place.

The only reason you ever experience anything "bad" is so that it can inspire the desire for something "good" within you. You are constantly being directed by your emotions and when something feels good to you, you know without a doubt that it is an experience you truly want. When something feels not-so-good, the opposite is the case.

So you may wonder, what is it that orchestrates this great symphony of ever-flowing form that creates your contrasting life experience? Well, it cannot be the form itself, for a conductor cannot conduct the music and play all the instruments simultaneously. It must be something more, something greater, something beyond the transient illusion of time, space, and matter.

While we experience the vivid music of this "Great Composer", often times we miss the one composing it, and we get lost in the intense sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and feelings that comprise our physical reality. It's as though the instruments have taken on a mind of their own, and, perceiving themselves as separate from their composer, they begin to function in disharmony. Their music is no longer pleasing to the ear, rather, it is quite painful.

The discordant noises represent the mind activity of most human beings who have lost touch with their Source, their essence. They have lost touch with the "Great Composer" and are no longer capable of playing in harmony with all the other instruments in the orchestra.

Eventually the instruments begin to break down from the dysfunctional music and are either destroyed, or through their suffering, forced to reconnect with the Great Composer and thereby produce harmonious music once more. The music then has an added quality to it, an ethereal quality, as the instruments become aware that they are not merely lone fragments, but part of a magnificent symphony arranged by the "Great Composer" who they are intimately intertwined with and infinitely connected to.

You, in fact, are this Great Composer molding and arranging the flow of form whether you consciously realize it or not. When you lose touch with this Truth, it is easy to lose your way in life and have a constant bitter taste in your mouth. To reconnect with your essential and ultimately formless nature is to taste the delectable sweetness of life once again and fulfill your purpose for existing in the first place.