Diluting Dissonance

So often I find myself contemplating the perceived challenges of practicing a spiritual mindset in corporate environments. Being professionally driven and spiritually serene simultaneously can result in, at best, cognitive dissonance and, at worse, acquiescence to singularity. Neither option seems sustainable.

When the inner dialogue feels inescapable, I imagine a place with no walls or barriers. I envision a shallow pool of water, infinite, lifeless. I do not feel the water, nor smell its air. This place is untouched, unchanging, unaffected. My only allowance is to glimpse its infinite purity. In the pool is a small sphere. Perfectly round, perfectly set. It is dark and metallic, reminiscent of hematite. It does not roll this way and that, it is heavy and unmoving. Stable and still. Sometimes there is a small wake, but it only ever emanates from the stone. The stone is the only presence.

With this image in mind, I breathe. Slowly, gradually more deeply. I feel my mind retract from the walls of my cranial cavity. There is space between my mind and the physical world.

I watch without expectation. I receive no answer, but I am not searching for one. Dissonant duality morphs into stability in the midst of unresolved issues.