Not the Measure of My Life

This is not "The Measure of My Life."

Is what I say.

That is to say: This Body is not the Measure of My Life,
This ability to see sights with the Eye
This ability to hear sounds with the Ear
This ability to smell scents with the Nose
This ability to taste savours with the Tongue
to feel touch with the Body
is not the Measure of My Life,
These experiences of pain and pleasure and not painful but not pleasant sense experiences arising from contact of sense organ with sense object are not the Measure of My Life,
These perceptions of sight, sound, scent, taste, touch and thought,
This conjuring of a world of my own making,
This conscious awareness of knowing knowing is not the Measure of My Life."

I look at a "Lucky Bamboo" I have purchased in the local enlightenment bookstore,
$2.95.
Certified Organic.

I have planted it.

I gesture towards the one-link, one-leaf plant: "I will take this as the measure of my life; as this bamboo lives, I live, as it dies, I die."

Would anyone in their right mind take such a vow?

Would anyone fix one's time here on an object so completely out of one's control?

No Way!

In exactly the same way: "This is not The Measure of My Life."

Epilogue

That "Lucky Bamboo" has been dead now for so long that I don't even remember when it died.