So many questions arise in the mind. Questions about knowledge, questions about duty. Apart from you, I myself have fashioned all these troubles with my own egotistical thinking. When I try to solve them, I find myself deliberating endlessly over the smallest matter, and even after deciding, I cannot rest easy—something keeps nagging at me. What I settle in one moment becomes unsettled the very next, and I begin to think again. In this restlessness, my mind has wandered so far from you. Having lost that former peace and simplicity, I can no longer feel you brightly, no longer taste the sweetness of your presence.
How many times have you told me to bring all my troubles to you, to sit with you if I must think, to seek to understand your will. Had I followed this command, I would not have fallen into such a state. My mind would have remained in you; my heart would have been absorbed in you. Because I did not obey you, I have come to this pass. See how your disobedient child, worn and broken by calamity, has returned to you again. From this moment on, I wish to live by your word.
Whenever I must decide something, I will remain with you. I will look toward your face, I will seek to know your will—and if I come to know it, I shall do that; if I cannot know it, I will not do anything born of my own imagination. This is my resolve now, though I cannot say how long it will hold. The habit of restless thinking has grown so strong that it brings inevitable suffering in its wake. Is this consequence truly inevitable? Will it last forever? Then what hope is left for life?
Through your grace, the power that flows into me dissolves so many obstacles. Will my karmic burden not be destroyed by that grace? Through your grace, I believe all things are possible. I will stop my wandering and come to your home, to sit at your feet. Let me sit steadily with you for a few days. Give me just a taste of your love. Then I will no longer wish to leave you. The path that has brought me such sorrow—I will have no desire to follow it anymore. I will come to know your will, I will trust in it, my mind will follow it with unwavering constancy. Without knowing your will, I will not be moved to do anything new.
The labor of thinking is exhausting me. Today itself, make it so that I must stop thinking—or that thinking simply ceases. Why do I continue on this path, multiplying sorrow, inviting death—both the death of the body and the death of the spirit? Let me spend the remaining time here in peace... gazing at your face, sitting in your lap, feeling the shelter of your arms. Let me come to know in my own life that the dharma you have taught is true, and that being true, it is indeed full of love, full of peace, full of joy, full of strength. Let me prove this to the world as well. In this way, make my life a success, make it true and worthy.