I’ve watched this pattern in myself and in so many people: we say we want to understand, we want clarity, we want the right framework.
But there’s a deeper urgency underneath that—something more honest, more human, more immediate.
If I slow down and really feel what’s driving the search, it isn’t “knowledge.” It’s tension. It’s contraction. It’s the sense that something about being me isn’t okay yet—and the hope that the next insight, the next plan, the next improvement will finally let me exhale.
So I’m going to name it plainly: what I really want is relief.
You Don’t Want to Understand. You Want Relief.
You don’t want to understand. You want relief.
This has been my experience working with people who are going through these deep transformations—these identity-level transformations.
We think we want to understand or we want to know, and this is pretty rampant. It’s a sticky tendency. It’s a sticky habit.
Because we use our mind so much. We use thought so much. We use analysis so much.
And it has relative value in the world. We figure our way through a lot of complex situations through reasoning and analysis, and even conversation and debate.
These uses of mind and thought have their value, without me needing to go into too much detail about that.
But when it comes to spirituality—when it comes to awakening, non-duality, whatever you want to call it—when it comes to that part of me that wants to engage the big question, the big tamale…
What often happens is the mind co-opts that.
Thought co-opts that and goes:
“Okay. I have to understand it.”
“If I could just understand everything about spirituality…”
“If I could just read enough about non-duality or anatta or Buddhism…”
“If I could read enough of the suttas, the Bahiya Sutta and whatever…”
“If I could use the right tools of analysis to understand the Tao Te Ching…”
“If I could get my mind around Tibetan Buddhism or Dzogchen…”
“If I could find the right way to process that in my mind…”
Then that would be satisfying.
There’s something that feels like that would do it.
But what I really want is not that.
I don’t want to understand.
I don’t want a mental map of spirituality when it comes to this deeper urge, this deeper prompt.
In my experience, and in my experience working with many, many people going through it, what I really want is relief.
A very simple thing.
I want relief.
The Tension Under the Labels
Part of recognizing that I want relief is seeing that I don’t have it.
I don’t feel relieved.
I feel tense.
I feel identified with thoughts.
I feel contracted.
I feel defended.
I feel avoidant.
I feel dissociated.
All of those feelings create tension.
And that tension becomes pathologized or clinicalized as anxiety, depression—broad terms.
There are types of anxiety and depression that are probably more acute psychiatric illnesses.
But the garden variety anxiety out there, and depression, and the general malaise of being a human—this, to me, is attributable to the tension I’m talking about:
The tension of struggle.
The tension of feeling separate.
The tension of feeling small.
The tension of seeking through thought.
The tension of buying the illusion of a future that never comes, but keeps promising I’ll finally get relief when this happens.
Then I get it, and it doesn’t happen.
“Oh, well, it wasn’t that. It’s the next thing. That’s where the relief is coming.”
The more I do that, the more I play leapfrog with myself, the more the tension builds.
And the more obvious it becomes: what I want is relief.
Relief-Seeking Shows Up Everywhere
This comes in so many forms.
Addictions are all about this.
Why am I addicted to a substance?
Because I don’t have strong will.
Because I was traumatized.
Because of some genetic predisposition.
Possibly true—contributory, all of those.
But there’s something more fundamental underlying that, and it’s very simple:
“I just don’t feel okay.”
“So this substance makes me feel a little better.”
“Maybe it makes me feel a lot better at times.”
This substance, this habit, this behavior, this pattern—whatever it is that I go to.
What’s my go-to?
There’s a wide spectrum—from relatively healthy habits to very unhealthy habits.
But they’re habits.
They’re coping mechanisms.
All of that is trying to find relief.
That’s what it is.
So all the seeking I’m doing, all the mentalizing I’m doing, all the fantasy, all the escape, all the addictions, the anxiety, the depression—these are symptoms of wanting relief, and attempts to get it.
What the Real Traditions Are Actually Offering
So what is this whole spiritual thing about?
And I don’t mean pop spirituality or New Age.
I mean what’s offered in the core of Zen, Dzogchen, traditional Buddhism.
What’s offered in Advaita Vedanta, modern Advaita.
What’s offered in this message that says I can cross the bridge of my own identity.
I can shed the veil of illusion—separation, suffering.
I can enter a path of profound transformation.
The most profound transformation.
More profound than any other experiential transformations that are out there as offerings.
Psychedelics, breathwork—these can cause profound experiences.
But that’s not what I’m talking about here.
I’m talking about the deepest transformations possible.
That’s where the relief comes.
Not necessarily right away, although with a first big shift there’s a tremendous amount of relief—and then some work that comes after that.
But that’s what this is about.
That’s what the spiritual endeavor is really about.
That’s what awakening shows me.
It shows me what is possible to wake up to.
And what is possible to wake up to is relief.
That’s it.
It’s all about relief.
Be Honest: What Do You Really Want?
So sometimes I like to be really clear, really simple, really pragmatic about this.
Be honest with yourself.
What do you really want?
If you want this and this and this—why do you want those?
What do you think it’s going to give you?
At some point, I arrive at the conclusion that I think it’s going to give me relief.
And even that is a milestone.
Even to see that is something—because I’m often so dissociated in thought, I don’t even see it.
I think:
“No, no, I have a great life.”
But I’m constantly seeking.
I’m on antidepressants.
I have a therapist that I see all the time.
I struggle in relationships.
I don’t sleep well.
And on and on and on.
Racing thoughts all the time.
Confusion, frustration, unconsciousness.
“But I’m doing great. I feel great.”
So sometimes I put the Band-Aid of “everything’s okay” or “I feel great” or “life is good.”
I put that little Band-Aid over everything else, and I don’t really look at the festering wound.
But if I look at the festering wound, I see: of course I want relief.
Relief Opens the Gateless Gate
And here’s the beautiful part.
That acknowledgment opens a door.
I can’t enter the gateless gate until I realize there’s a reason to do that.
I might enter it anyway, but the vast majority of people don’t until they finally realize:
“I have to go there.”
“I have to enter that gateless barrier.”
“I have to cross the gateless barrier to address this fundamental problem of unsatisfactoriness.”
And relief is what I want.
So it’s okay.
Be selfish.
I don’t have to be selfless.
I don’t have to be a bodhisattva to want relief.
To be honest with myself.
To be congruent with my deepest truth.
To see deeply into how I’m made up—what my processing is actually pointing to.
All of that is pointing to relief.
Relief Is Your Birthright
And the beauty of this is: I not only deserve relief, it’s my birthright.
And relief it is.
And it’s available.