The Empty Warehouse

I looked around and beheld a whole universe full of empty boxes.

One day I was looking inside myself and I came across a warehouse. It was a vast warehouse, I don't know how I missed it. It was exactly as big as the universe that you and I live in.

Looking through that warehouse I found a box that was meant for me. It was completely empty, and I could not understand why it should be so. I had some vague memory of gifts in my life that were meant for this box. I would accept them with a grateful heart, and pretend to put them there, only to put them somewhere else. Sometimes I would find something precious inside the box and take it out, thinking it must be in the wrong place. Outside of the box these treasures turned to dust or became impossible to find again.

I do not know why I had done all of this. It seemed to me now a mistake. The idea came from somewhere that this box was not meant for treasure. I didn't realize that idea had taken hold, and so it had taken hold of everything.

There were many empty boxes like that in the warehouse. I looked around and beheld a whole universe full of empty boxes. Because the box that was meant for me was empty, the boxes that were meant for other people were also empty. I had been waiting to receive the treasure I could put in those boxes, but here they were, empty. I felt an unbearable sadness. Perhaps I should have been out discovering that treasure, or crafting it myself.

I kept looking, wishing to find something besides empty boxes. I understood that the emptiness I feel sometimes in the universe I live in with you is an echo of the emptiness I find here. I made a quiet decision to look for new treasure, and to be open to the treasure that finds me.