When Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche was just a small boy in Tibet, he studied under a famous master named Jamgon Kongtrul Rinpoche.

One day, the young boy was called into his Master’s chambers. The room glowed with a soft morning light, which at first warmed and then welcomed him in.

As he stepped closer, he saw his Master seated at the window – and in his hand, was the most spectacular object the young boy had ever seen.

What was it, silver?

Slightly bowed at one end, with long, pointed tendrils that at first captured, then shattered the rays into a million points of light. Flashes of gold danced through the room, like Koi, breaking the stillness of the morning pond.

“In the West, they use this to eat,” his master explained. “They poke it into meat and then they use it to lift the meat up and put it in their mouth. Someday, you’re going to go where people eat with these things.”

And, balancing the object playfully between two fingertips, he grinned, “And, you might just find that they’re a lot more interested in staying asleep than in waking up.”

You see, what the young boy regarded as ‘magic’ – was something we might otherwise dismiss. After all, a fork is just a fork – is it not?

I often wonder what it might be, to view the whole world without ever knowing these names. To see something as it really is, and not as what we think it to be.

And yet, here we are stuck in this ‘land of forks’ – where distractions have become a fixture of our being.

Why, even the tiniest of electronic devices – no bigger than our palm – steal us away with each incessant chirp. And, the stories of our lives are shared within the limits of a 160 character posting.

Perhaps, we’ve become too digitized to notice the much simpler things. Like, the way the light dances when it meets our edges. Or, the cozy warmth of a little pup curled against our leg.

To be free of our knowing, to soften our often fixed mind invites the possibility of awakening.

In letting go of this knowing, my darlings – we are creating the space for living.