When you try to control something, it will slip through your fingers, like water

on the subject of satori (understanding, comprehension) in zen buddhism, and trying to hold on or cling to this understanding, this spiritual awareness, this universal energy:

...the minute you grab the living thing, it’s like catching a handful of water: the harder you clutch, the faster it squirts through your fingers. There’s nothing to get hold of, because you don’t need to get hold of anything. You had it from the beginning.

source: Zen Bones by Alan Watts