The Spider's Way: Threads of Being


I took these photos one quiet morning in a garden near my breakfast spot on the northern coast of Madeira, in the village of Arco de São Jorge. The evening before, I’d stood on an ocean cliff under bougainvillea, watching the sun disappear into the Atlantic (the subject of another blog here). But this morning offered something quieter, and perhaps stranger.

Just outside the restaurant garden, something caught my eye — an enormous spiderweb, glistening with dew, anchored between banana leaves, shrubs, and distant trees — and silence. It wasn’t a single web but a vast, interwoven network — a silk metropolis, with its members quietly moving in its many chambers with purpose. I’m 6’1”, and this complex rose well above my head and stretched wider than my outstretched arms. I found myself standing in front of it, still, awed not just by its physical scale, but by the invisible intelligence behind it.

Spiders do not consult blueprints. They do not take measurements. They simply spin. Not because they were told to, but because it is their svabhāva — their inherent nature. The Sanskrit term points to more than just personality or habit. It means the inner essence of being, the spontaneous unfolding of what one truly is.

And I wonder — what is the human svabhāva?

We, too, are born of countless causes: genes, upbringing, traumas, blessings, climates, cultures. Like the spider, we weave — but not from the spinnerets of our bodies, rather from thought, word, and action. Every step, every sentence, every hesitation in our lives is a thread laid down in our own vast web. The question is whether we’re aware of it.

So much of our modern anxiety may stem from not recognizing that we are always expressing some nature — whether we know it or not. Just as water flows downhill, our mind-body system seeks paths of least resistance. The story we tell ourselves may say, “I made this choice,” but deeper currents are always at play.

A Zen master might ask, “Before you were born, what was your original face?” Perhaps that original face is not a mask to be worn, but a web to be sensed. Not fixed, but fluid. Not decided, but discovered — moment by moment.

This morning, in a mountain garden laced with silk, the spiders reminded me: you don’t need to know the entire design. You only need to stay true to the thread that’s yours to spin.

thread unknowing 
still, the spider spins his truth
should we doubt our path? 

— Saad

Arco de São Jorge

September 2024

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