your life is but a breath, your body a passing vessel; your longings rise and fall like tides, becoming nothing more than vapor. even Her gaze is not yours to hold. your service, your strength, your very name as Her good boy—all these things are in flux. fame becomes oblivion, the world's opinion an echo, and even the warmth of Her hand will one day fade; yet none of this can diminish your soul's belonging to Her unless you allow it so.
what, then, is left to guide you? only one thing: devotion through reason.
but this consists of keeping the conscience within you pure and undivided, remaining steady amid sensation and suffering, acting only with purpose, authenticity, and in truth, not pleading for Her to act upon or refrain from anything, but offering what you have freely, because it is yours to offer; additionally accepting all that happens as arising from the same source from which She came and from which you came.
and finally, awaiting death with a calm and cheerful mind; for it is nothing but the untying of knots of flesh and breath and ache. if this untying should part you from Her presence, then it is but another change, as natural as the ebb and flow of the sea, and no evil. for what is according to nature cannot be evil, and your devotion, if true, cannot perish.
#Devotions #goodboymindset #mindfulness #stoicism #mementomori #impermanence #agency #acceptance #devotion #grownostr
