Reminding yourself of who you are

Thich Nhat Hanh was asked in an interview “Is there a purpose for wearing the robe other than to clothe your body?” He replied, “To remind yourself that you are a monk.” 

I wonder if one day you or I might also be asked a question about reminding ourselves of who we are. And you might say something about tying a strand of yellow yarn around your finger or tattooing the lines from a poem across your forearm, wrapping saffron silk and sashes around your body, wrapping your hijab around your head, hanging your crucifix over your heart.

You might say something about embodying this time and space and presence, lest you look down at your hands or heart or up at your head and see no reminder. Lest you forget that you are sacred. 

And you or I might go on to say that if we still miss our own embodied reminders, there will be a morning where we will wake early and see how the sun is rising and sending streams and sashes of purple into the dim blue-lit sky.

Or there’ll be a night where we fall into bed and meet the story that has been waiting for us, an afternoon where we turn a corner and greet the well of wonder.

First appeared in Ruminate’s Issue 50