Well… not really. After reading the Zen book, Sit Down and Shut Up: Punk Rock Commentaries on Buddha, God, Truth, Sex, Death, and Dogen’s Treasury of the Right Dharma Eye, I pretty much realized that there is no cosmic breakthrough. You just come to accept things the way they are. Everyone struggles so much to gain this or that, to be this or that… it’s so friggin’ exhausting! So, just like God — people are trying to look for something to take their pain away. Something else to strive for, to comfort them. There isn’t anyone or anything like that “out there.” It is all up to you — you and yourself — to drop all that crap you’ve piled up on yourself. (That reminds me of  The Junk Lady in Labyrinth — just piling all the old comfortable things on Sarah’s shoulders, just to hide form the truth of what she’d done.) I know, I know, this sounds so negative. But really, I’m not coming from a negative place. Life just is what it is. Trust me — I’m no devout Buddhist either. I’m interested in the dharma, but not dogma. I’m trying to get back to that place I was 5 or so years ago. That spiritual journey that many go on. I’m still looking, still learning.