Arrived in L.A. today and checked into the wonderfully fun and oddball Figueroa Hotel. I was given a tiny tiny room, no bigger than a monk’s cell, which barely had space for a bed and a little writing desk. And I find myself charmed by this.
I am pretty sure I would not want to dwell in a monk’s cell. And yet there is something comforting, in an unexpected way, in temporarily entering a smaller and simpler world – for a time reducing your personal space to not much more than bed, desk, and a little nook to hang your shirts.
It is a kind of vacation from the large, an affirmation of Thoreau’s observation that “Our life is frittered away by detail… simplify, simplify.” And in a way such a little aesthetic vacation validates what the Zen Buddhists have been saying all along: once you stop focusing on adding objects into your environment, you become more able to wander at will in your mind, unfettered and free.
OOOOOMMMMMMMM!!!!!
Namaste! 🙂