Undress to Dress

 

Take only the essential things 

If you bring nostalgia, don't carry its sorrow. 

The Sun demands the prayer be naked: 

Dress in your gala, walk eternities. 

The first verse of the poem, "Lleva sólo las cosas esenciales" (Take only the essential things), is not an imperative as we might think from its grammatical category, but a recommendation, a suggestion that invites reflection on human existence for those who are beginning their journey, or for those who are already traveling and feel too much weight on their shoulders. This phrase calls us to the radical simplification of life, and it ignites a fire in our intention: in a world saturated with objects, desires, and superfluous concerns, it asks us to discern between the necessary and the contingent, both in what we naively consider material and in matters of the soul. The "essential things" are principles of Dharma: serenity, generosity, broad-mindedness, innocence, joy, courage, the love of beauty... Life is conceived as a journey in which the weight of the unnecessary becomes a burden that hinders progress. Lightness is the fundamental condition for freedom, and that lightness is with respect to masks or mental constructs, inertias, and unconscious mechanisms.

The essential is always present. When it belongs to the world of form, it is immutable, it underlies the transience of the sensible world. From this perspective, the first verse is an exhortation to seek truth and beauty in their purest form, by shedding an unnecessary baggage. The child takes their toys on a journey. You take the toys that are essential for the game that is the Path itself: these toys are never objects. The space of the mystical journey is revealed only when the fundamental structure of existence spontaneously emerges from the multiplicity of its manifestations.

From a certain moment in our lives, the persona is unnecessary luggage. The belief in the social masks we adopt to interact with the world must be left behind. The journey of self-knowledge requires a shedding, not as a renunciation, for all renunciation belongs to the ego, but as a desire for Light, a desire for the "I Am," the final desire.

The second verse of the poem, "Si traes nostalgia no cargues con su pena" (If you bring nostalgia, do not carry its sorrow), introduces the theme of memory and the past, addressing nostalgia as a yearning and as a complex emotion in which our mask of identity gets entangled. Nostalgia, etymologically "pain for returning" (nóstos and álgos), can be a source of comfort, but also a heavy chain that ties us to the past. The verse does not ask us to renounce memories, but to the "sorrow" that often accompanies them. It is an act of discernment between enriching memory and the cycle of repetitive and destructive inertia, a sterile pain that reaffirms a grieving and lost ego. When nostalgia crystallizes into inertia, it anchors us to a representation of the past that took fleeting forces of meaninglessness as real, based on a pleasure or a pain.

The poem invites us to transform nostalgia into a source of gratitude, to look at memories not as losses, but as a navigator's experiences, and as forms of love and beauty. Nostalgia without sorrow is the cup from which we drink a strong wine of ambrosia and venom, transforming in our throat, like Nilkanth, opposing intensities into Ananda. We leave the sorrow behind without rejecting it, without fleeing from it, with gratitude for having found an ingredient that makes the flavor of memory more profound, and alchemically transmutes what has been lived into a greater breadth of the Trikala of life.

Nostalgia can be understood as a manifestation of Ishq, a central concept in Sufism that refers to passionate divine love. Ishq is not a worldly love, but a force that drives the seeker to return to their origin, to a state of union with the Absolute. Nostalgia transmutes its heaviness into a wing and an impetus for the journey towards the eternal. By freeing nostalgia from its "sorrow," memory becomes a mirror of the invisible. It is not a lament for loss, but a yearning for the return to the Source, a love so passionate that it does not allow for rest in ephemeral forms. It is the deep impulse of the soul for the reunion with that "Home" from which it was exiled by its own will, so that you and the world could exist. Nostalgia, in this context, is an echo of that primordial vision, a reminder of the lost paradise which, when integrated without sorrow, becomes the driving force of return and encounter.

The third line of the poem, "El Sol exige desnuda la plegaria" (The Sun demands the prayer be naked), is a plea for radical purity, for total sincerity. It is a declaration that one cannot access the Numen with artifices, pretensions, or masks. The verse resonates with mystical traditions worldwide. In Sufism, the seeker must shed the small self, not through mere repression, but through understanding and transformation. It is about getting rid of the ego's shadow by integrating it into a "medium for the experience of life." Mevlana Rumi speaks to us of the need to be naked before the Beloved, to offer a pure heart, without the veils of worldly illusion. This is equivalent to the "beginner's mind" (shoshin of Zen) with which we approach every experience without preconceived ideas, with an openness and humility that resemble the "naked prayer." This "beginner's mind" is the primordial mind of the child, the fitra of which the Sufis speak. The Sun, in its immense and dazzling purity, cannot be approached with shadows. Light demands light.

The "naked prayer" is like an act of radical vulnerability. In a world where strength is confused with invulnerability, the poem suggests that true strength resides in the capacity to be authentic and vulnerable. Confessing our imperfections, fears, and deepest desires, not necessarily to an external deity, but to our own consciousness, is a transformative act of courage and the foundation of any process of healing and growth.

The fourth and last line, "Viste tus galas, camina eternidades" (Dress in your finery, walk eternities), seems to contradict the previous verses. If we are asked to shed everything and offer a naked prayer, why are we urged to wear finery? The apparent contradiction is resolved through a redefinition of the terms. The "finery" is not the vain masks, nor the superficial adornments of the persona. They are the fruits of the first three lines: the lightness of the essential, the wisdom of a nostalgia without sorrow, and the purity of a sincere prayer. The finery the poem speaks of are the garments of Dharma. The poem does not ask us to dress up as something we are not, but to celebrate our true nature, which has emerged after the shedding. Undress to dress; if you put Dharma on top of your masks, you will make a horrendous grimace of Beauty. First naked and vulnerable, so that Dharma can fit our forms and its texture can suit us in full harmony.

Finally, the imperative "camina" (walk) recapitulates the meaning of "lleva" (take) and openly unfolds the complete meaning of the melody the poem draws, by modifying the action and placing it in the human's natural domain: the eternities. There is no other journey. When we walk with the finery of our essence, every step is significant, every moment is full, and time, as we know it, dissolves into a backdrop of the sea.

There are four ways to walk eternities:

1. By making a cyclic journey. Here, time is the wheel of Samsara. From the perspective of the Shahid, who as a witness is already wearing his finery, this repetition is not a condemnation, but a process of infinite ecstasy. Each cycle is an act of Lila, a work of art to show the beauty of shedding the "essential things" and the "sorrow" of nostalgia. The Shahid observes the cycles of the world ("eras of errors that roll and repeat") with a serenity that ignores sadness, recognizing that each cycle offers the possibility of advancing on the path of Ishq. The repetition becomes a ritual of detachment, and the traveler learns not to cling to temporal manifestations, no matter how beautiful or painful they may be. By walking eternities, the Shahid goes beyond the cycle, observing it from outside of time.

2. By making a linear journey. Time is an arrow moving from the past to the future. For the traveler-witness, this line is not a senseless progression, but a path of evanescent love. Every present moment is a final and unique opportunity for the "naked prayer," for a final and unique manifestation of truth. The Shahid does not live in the past or the future, but in the immense density of the "now." His linear journey is a process of unveiling eternity in the ephemeral. By "walking eternities" on this line, the Shahid lives every instant as a portal to the divine, recognizing that the fullness of being is not a future destination, but a perfection that manifests in every fleeting step.

3. By making a divergent journey, walking through a garden of forking paths. Here, each choice or present moment branches into multiple realities, creating parallel universes. From the perspective of the Shahid, this divergence is not a fragmentation of reality, but the manifestation of a single and same source in an infinity of forms. The traveler-witness, having seen the unity, understands that all branches of the temporal tree are supported by the same root. The "finery" the poem speaks of is the consciousness of that unity. The Shahid "dresses in his finery" and walks through the divergent eternities with the certainty that, no matter which path he takes, the underlying truth remains. The multiplicity of realities does not hide the uniqueness of the sacred, but reveals it in its infinite creative capacity.

4. By knowing the journey is nonexistent. All identities, all journeys, are the Dream of the Eternal and Immutable. There is no Shahid, no nostalgia, no path. Only an Infinite Ananda sounds like a distant echo, spontaneously, pointing towards a Deeper Mystery.

The poem is a guide for the existential journey. It proposes a series of stages: first, the shedding of the unnecessary; second, the healing of the past through Ishq; third, the purification of the spirit through vulnerability; and fourth, the manifestation of Dharma in the world by navigating the eternities.