We often see views from my window from around the world on Facebook in the stream where people illustrate their vision from what they see of the world and surroundings, from where they sit so to speak. A snapshot shared with others depicting their place in the world. When we truly begin to see ourselves in the world, we are to not look sideways – but look to the horizon and divine order.

To see ourselves as the portal that moves or takes us, and others, beyond the present and asking what it is that takes us there. What is a portal? A portal is seen as a door, gate, or entrance that takes us to a place beyond where we are now. 

What is it that takes us there? This quest and question are eternal and akin to finding clothes that fit for our journey beyond where we find ourselves and what we think we know. It is as though when physical appearances become less apparent all that remains is our virtue. In that how we see the world we see ourselves. And how we treat ourselves and the nature that surrounds us that defines our path. 

For myself, it begins by looking back to beginnings, ancestors, memories, and mentors. To those who have guided our spirit over the centuries. Many believe that it is our spirit that flows through the ages from generation to generation and that re-connecting with this flow of energy is our ultimate endeavor. The intrinsic wisdom and virtue residing in each of us – just as with all things found in nature as an evolving entity. Letting our mud settle, as the Buddhist would say, reminding us to have discipline and patience.

To the left Manjusri, who asks us to take the bodhisattva vow, that we are to live by the precept of self-awareness and wisdom.  

That meditation and silence brings forth from within reminders of where we have been with self-awareness that acknowledges who we have always been, am now, and will be in the future and going there by living and seeing beyond the present, as if living beyond the present is where we all should hope to be found. 

This brings us back to living as the portal exemplifying change. We change the world and our environment by and through how we live. Beginning with correcting past mistakes, acknowledging our responsibility for them, and touching all things only with virtue. We are the window to which the universe responds. Moving beyond simply the view from our window and what we think we know, to identifying with what is unknowable and finding our comfort there. To what empowers us as well as others by becoming the teacher, as we in-turn become the student for tomorrow’s benefit. It is often said that knowing our past is our prologue to the future. It will be the portal we find and follow that will take us there.