Your old room

Another work pops up in my "fb memories" for the benefit of my non-Bikol speaking friends, i tried to put it in English. I wrote this for my grandmother whom i used to visit while she was in the last stages of her diabetes.

This was after the funeral. The room she used to be was now a "happy" room. It was as if the room itself was freed from carrying the burden of having her there, suffering, her blindness, her senility, her hundreds of aches and pains brought by her disease and old age.

Suffering in this world is natural, as my teacher aptly said. We are not supposed to be here in the first place. We must not try to endeavor for a "happy" condition in this place where the natural state is under these four: birth, diseases, old age and death. yes, there is a little happiness here, the first few minutes of holding your new iphone; your first kiss perhaps; or that moment while you were being crowned the most beautiful girl in the world; or the first time you saw your daughter; so on. But like gulps of air before drowning these joys are. they easily lose their flavor. it's like in the desert, you tried drinking the mirage, and finding out it's just sand. this is not our home.

ofcourse we all want to be happy. happiness is our natural condition. but how? we've tried everything: tried drugs, rock n roll, sex; done the money thing, done the title thing, done the power thing, done the health thing, nothing satisfies, nothing fills me up. im still empty.

saintly teachers give us a practical solution: if we want to be happy, we must know what will make us happy. to know what will make us happy, we must know what we are. who we are. who am i? material things cannot satisfy me, i must be made of something else. God through His devotees reveal the truth about our identity: you are the eternal spirit soul, part and parcel of God. You are not matter, you are not your body or your mind. no amount of material things will ever satisfy you.

so we come and pass away from this world believing we are our bodies and minds. we think this is our home so we are in great difficulty leaving this world, and all our attachments. therefore to die peacefully we must be situated in knowledge. i am eternal, i will pass from here to another place. there is another world.

English translation: Your old room.

Your old room, is now the TV room. For those who don’t know what this was before, will never know what it was before. Your rocking chair now blends in with the new sofa, flowery, it goes well with the curtains. Not a single thing now is out of place. Where were these colors when you were still here?Where was this sun? When time was your visitor, no one dared to join in the conversation composed mainly of one long gasp. You were wrung by waiting until you became air. The falling of the curtain.

But darkness has long been in your eyes. Even before the cataract. Perhaps this is the fate of all who looks upon the world. But who am I with my speculations? What do I know about the dark, I who have no heart? My path is haunted by a certainty that will come someday.Someday, someday. Perhaps this is just how the flow pushes every presence to become absent. A dream that quickens as it nears waking. You were just here, now you are not. Someday—someday—even me whose steps can still keep up with the steady movement of the moment, will also stop, someday, until caught up by the arriving, and become past.

Bikol:
Su dati mong kwarto, TV room na palan. Su dai nakaaram kun ano ini dati, dai maaaraman kun ano ini dati. Su liya-liya mo, nagblend in na sa ba’gong sopa, burakan, terno sa kurtina. Dai na lamang ki nawalat na wara sa lugar.Harain an mga kulor na ini kaitong yaon ka digdi? Hain ining sildang? Kan bisita mo an oras, warang muyang umintra sa hururon na kumposo ki sarong halawigon na hangos. Piniga ka kan paghalat, sagkod sa puro kan paros. An pagwaltak kan kurtina.

Ugaring, haloy na bagang uya sa mata mo an diklom. Ba’go pa an katarata. Gabos man garong matang nagmaan sa kina’ban, garo iyo na an padumanan. Ugaring, sisay man ako buda an sakong mga ispekulasyon? Ano man an aram ko sa diklom, akong daing daghan? Pigduduno an dalan kan siertong ngapit? Ngapit, ngapit. Arog sana talaga kaini garo an sulog na nagbubusol sa lambang yaon na pumasiring sa dai. Sarong pangaturugan na nagkakaskas pag harani na an pagmuklat. Yaon ka pa sana digdi; ngonian wara ka na. Ngapit—ngapit—dawa akong nakakalapag pa an kada lakad sa danay na andar kan ngonian na ti’makan, matunong man, ngapit, sagkod, maabtan kan paabot, buda maging nakaagi.

10-16-12. Karangahan.

Here Lies Peace, a poem

i thought i’d give my mind a little exercise, so i flexed my brain muscles by translating this poem i came across in the “fb memories.” i recalled writing this poem after burying the body of my father-- or was it my granduncle? Anyway, it was a significant time for me and a great turning point, as it was when i picked up my chanting beads again and continued on the path of spiritual-consciousness.
my literary education forbids me to explain a poem bluntly, but what the heck, i’ll spare a few words at least. if you’re to read the poem, i am in a cemetery, pondering upon tombstones. i have this habit of reading stuff on tombstones and try to extract a story out of each. how could have this person died? she’s too young...on and on. but more interesting for me are those tombstones that are so washed out that the names are wiped off clean by time and weather. and a question of existence assails me. no name, no person? what happens now? it was a very educational experience for me so i was having fun a bit, but this very same situation would’ve been very different if it weren’t for my background in the science of identity.

when i was growing up i always thought that i was the body. so death for me was an extremely claustrophobic thought: i will be cramped up in that cement box until the angels blow their trumpets for resurrection? so i used to look at tombstones with horror, in fact i seldom look at them at all. but with the mercy of my spiritual guide, the most fearless man i know, i was freed from this fear of death and, yes, tombstones. he simply relayed to me the absolute truth that passed down from one saintly teacher to another, a line which can be traced back to God Himself: i am a spiritual spark of God, i am not my body. i am the spirit-soul within that body. the body will die, but i will go on existing. with the strength of knowledge i faced this fear every single moment.

what we fear about death is not so much the pain of death, but the fear of losing the body we identify ourselves with. with the body comes its extensions such as the name, titles, relatives, race, gender, properties, politics etc. no one, no matter how powerful, can resist splitting away from his body though. demons like Hiranyakasipu who performed superhuman austerities just to prolong his stay in his body are in the end forced out, evicted by God Himself from their temporary apartment. and we are persistent. suppose we lose the body eventually, we ask our relatives to preserve that body like what they are doing to President Marcos. incidentally that’s what we also do to pickles, at least one can eat the pickles... but that glass box will have to go someday and that beloved body will succumb to the earth. if we are not as big as Marcos, we settle with just prolonging our name on a marble. here lies so and so...he was loved... and the cemetery is full of these names on stones, full of dates of births and deaths. hold on, hold on. please don’t forget. but time is death’s master, and he will erase all these names from the face of the earth eventually as evidenced by the clear, flawless tomb stones. everything will be forgotten.

the last line of the poem alludes to John Keats’ epitaph that goes: here lies one whose name was writ in water. such a romantic way to fade away. when you have a debt and it is written in water, it means don’t bother to remember it. these names once written in stone but eventually erased by time are now written in water. we spend our lives having our names placed on a piece of paper to be hung on a wall or on a bronze plate at some door. we take care of our name as good as we take care the body connected to that name but in the end it will end up in some stone in the cemetery someday. oh, but not my name, it’s in history books! okay let’s burn all the books. oh, but mine is etched on a colossal statue. smash that statue down. which reminds me of a poem by Keats’ friend Percy Shelley, “Ozymandias”:
I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
__________

Nothing material will endure. Nothing perishable will remain.
The body and everything connected with it are all made of matter. Even the name: material sound vibration. therefore we, being spiritual being, cannot take shelter of our material name, or our president’s name, our country’s name, our favorite superhero’s name, even our parent’s name... they will all be written in water, in the river of time.

but there is a name that will never fade away. there is a name that will endure. a name that is not contaminated by any tinge of matter. the Holy Names of the Absolute Truth, the One Supreme Person, are countless: Allah, Jehova, Govinda, Eloi, Krishna, and many more...These Names are etched not only in stone or scribed in scriptures, but most importantly They are kept in the pure hearts of the devotees who spread These Names time after time. you can take shelter of These Names, for they are incorruptible by time and death, in fact the Holy Name is time Himself in this material realm. simply by chanting These Names, we will be freed from the ignorance exemplified by our hankering to glorify our own lusterless names in stone. thank you very much for bearing the long intro. so here’s the poem:

English translation:
Here lies peace. In stone chests
confined are the breathless hopeful to breathe
again. In the end neither bone nor ash will remain of the ashen
but names, when they were still objects, like us
chiseled on marble, written by paint or molded bronze.
Such anxiety of being forgotten, when oblivion is guaranteed end!
Look at the perfect faded stones. Only these are what's real here.
Realizing that everything akin to the dirt will be food for serenity.
All that is uttered that will remind of warm days and places
will be appropriately called with sound acceptable to silence
All will be given a name written in water.

10-14-16
Karangahan

Bikol:
Yaon digdi pigsasararay an katoninungan. Sa mga gapong baul
Dai makahangos an mga nakalaom na naglalaom na makahangos
Gilayon. Ngapit bako tu’lang o abo an matatadang gira kan mga napara
Kundi mga apod, kan sinda mga bagay pa, arog satuya,
Nakatigib sa marmol, kinurit kan pintura o pinormang bronse.
Kaniguan an hadit na dai marumduman dawa kalingawan an siguradong sagkodan.
Hilinga an perpeksiyon kan mga pulinas na gapo. Ini man sana an totoo digdi.
Patotoo na gabos digding may labot sa kinaban pagkaon kan katoninungan.
Gabos na sina’wod na maparumdom kan mga maimbong na aldaw buda lugar
Tatawan ki nagkakanigong apod na aakuon kan kawa’ran ki tanog,
Gabos bubunyagan ki mga ngaran na nakasurat sa tubig.

10-14-2011. Karangahan.

Ako Pukawa

Ako nangaturugan

Sa sarong pangaturugan

Ki tulong kakanon.

 

Nahiling ko su saro

Kulor puti, su saro kulor dugo

Su saro diklom.

 

Lambang tuludan

Tulo an kagdara

Su saro karahayan

Su saro kamawotan

Su saro kawaran.

 

Pinarong ko, su saro

Burak. Su saro sulo,

Su saro udo.

 

Kan tinanan ko, su saro

Mahamis, su saro maharang

Su saro maranggis.

 

Ako nakakataram

Na ako nagkakan

sa sarong pangaturugan

Mantang nasa sarong pangaturugan

Ngonian na ako na gimata,

Ta mantang itoon duman

Ako warang pagkaaram

Kun nata daing kabasugan

Dawa paburubalyo sa tulong plato.

 

Pero ako ngonian mata

Sa sarong pangaturugan sana.

Aram kong ako turog pa

Ta digdi sa sakong minuklatan

Ako nag-inom sa salog

Sa burabod, sa bubon

Pero dai nahahali

An sakuyang paha.

 

3.24.2015

 

"An solusyon sa satuyang paha, iyo kun masasabutan ta kun SIISAY an napapaha. Kaipuhan tang magimata."

ON FEMINISM

"I saw men exploiting women, now the women want their turn. Not seeing the person in their clothes..." Siddha. 

In college, I attended this class on Feminism in literature. The teacher, a Dr of Feminism, asked me what I think about gender. The class was mid-afternoon and it was nearing summer, I was half-awake when I fumbled for an answer. I managed to blurt out: I don't believe in gender. If there was a fail button in that class, it would be labelled with those words. She was fuming, she was close to pulling out her hair, she paced back and forth the platform like she was contemplating the end to sadness. I wanted to die in my chair. And perhaps my seatmate too, we being the only guys in what was becoming an amazona jungle kingdom scenario.    

The dr pointed out the stark differences in our bodies. You are a man. I am a WOMAN. I go to the girls toilet. You go to the boys toilet. So on and so forth. 

I never forgave myself for saying what I said. Gender is truth, i carved that statement into my psyche. In the next four years of my stay in college I trained myself to think like a feminist. I don't want to fall into another embarrassing situation like that. 

Then I encountered the statement Aham Brahmasmi. I am spirit. I am not my body. I am not my mind. The material body is just a dress. The spiritual body is the actual body. The spirit doesn't have race, nationality, titles and gender. These things are the consequence of our temporary dress: the material body. I had another turn around. 

People struggle for equality. In fact, March is also national women's month. I remembered my college professor Dr. Feminist who breathes (and breathes on people too) I AM WOMAN and the statement I gave her about gender. 

If we have the vision to see that all living entities are spirit souls. Then there is no question of inequality. We are all constitutionally the same in essence: spirit. But if we remain in the material platform then differences abound. You are a negro, you are a muslim, that is a cow, here is my dog, this is my brother, etc. 

The material body is real. And in order to have a civilization men and women should have different toilets. But the belief that i am my body. I am a man, you are a woman is based on ignorance of the absolute truth, aham brahmasmi, I am spirit.

REAL FEMINISM. 

Although it is most apparent in the temporary female form, Femininity exists in the absolute plane. It is gentleness that is not necessarily weakness. It is shyness that is graceful. It is softness that is fair. It is meekness that is tolerant. In essence, as fragmental spiritual parts of the Supreme Spirit, we are all females, regardless of what bodily dress we have now, we are dominated by a force bigger than ourselves. To accept our position as the dominated and not the dominator is accepting things as they are. Celebrate femininity with soft heartedness, mercy, compassion, kindness, selfless love.

A Rose

Everything came from nothing, randomness or chaos, has been the long standing conclusion of science regarding the origin of anything, including life in our universe. As we know it--as they know it. Everything we see in this world came from nothing. Everything just happened to happen. I've thought about it for the longest time, and when I'm in the sterile box of my room full of black and white words on squares it seems to make sense in my mind. But then I see this rose with its layers of intricate petals arranged in a pattern so organized you'd think a machine so complex beneath the ground had manufactured it, that I always return to my heart that says there's got to be someone so supremely intelligent, cool and creative who designed and made that. Come to think of it: everything or most things in this world that supposedly came from chaos or disharmony have harmony, symmetry, patterns: the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, wet and dry season, a woman's menstrual cycle, planting and harvesting, the veins on leaves, the tides, our very aging, birth and death, over and over, again and again, patterns everywhere. If chaos or randomness, had created this rose, then perhaps I can imitate randomness by tearing down this rose, plucking out all its petals, leaves, thorns, etc., put these parts in a box and shake it until all the parts, petals, stem, thorns, scent, fall in the right place and form themselves into a rose. The question then would be how long should I be shaking that box. How many years, centuries or millennia of shaking that box full of petals, leaves, etc., would it take anyone to create one decent rose that the humble earth grows effortlessly? The probability is so slim that I can confidently say it's impossible. I mean, taking randomness aside, who among us or even our brightest scientists who dared explain the universe, with everything our latest technology can offer create a rose just like that? 

On watching "Interstellar" (2014)

Jans here's what i think about your highly recommended sci fi movie.  

It's amazing how human intelligence endeavors to explain the entirety of our universe. How immense? Astronauts had to sleep for months just to reach Saturn. They had to use a wormhole just to get out of our own galaxy. It's mind blowingly big. Then there's time. Simply awesome to think about it. 

But the best explanation I heard about our universe was from my teacher on spiritual science, who said that Everything is contained in the sacred sound 'Krish-na' (or God's Name). All the spiritual and material worlds, universes, variegatedness, time, space or non-space, everything and everything that is outside of that everything, are all contained in the sound 'Krishna'.

Tonight, I look at the stars, and beyond. I recall the images i saw from the film. The little spacecraft floating in space. Somewhere is Saturn (or whatever it is called by entities there), another galaxy or a blackhole. Somewhere there are planets with life. It's almost scary, the vastness is overwhelming. It tells you point blank: you're smaller than no one. Your concerns--sex, fame, money, power--are shamefully insignificant. And it's true. 

I love the part in the movie where it was said that love can puncture the rigid laws of time and space. True love is transcendental. i may just be a speck in one dark corner of the entirety of everything but i hold on to the truth that i am loved with a love that is absolutely constant irregardless of the effects of time, space or variations in gravity.

I am happy that the film resolved it this way: at the end of science or the mind, love will be our light. Love is that connection from any point in this universe to the pivot, core or source: Krish-na. 

Cc: Jamila

I am not my mind

What's the use of having a "great mind" if all i can think of is sex, what's my next meal's gonna be, how do i best others, how do i keep remaining in this temporary condition-and worst of all-i am my mind?

i believe that what is (still)essential is not the fact that we have great minds, but that we can be able to control our minds, great or dull, from dragging us towards the darkest region of ignorance: ignorance about what life is, what our real purpose is, and above all who we really are. 

the mind is a vehicle, you, the spirit self, are the driver. your mind may run from 0 to 230 km/h in a split second and mine in an hour but what should matter is whether you and me are able to drive it and not the other way around. 

it is said also that the mind can be our best friend or our worst enemy: when you are forced by your mind to do things you know are bad for you then clearly it is an enemy, when your mind helps you in remembering things that can help you achieve the real benefits in life, happiness, peace, self realization, then it is your friend. 

Haribol! _/\_

The Blood Scam

The blood scam. It works under the premise that everything can be inherited: intelligence, holiness, heroism, kindness, etc.There's this guy who became president because his mom and dad were known heroes. If you're born in a family of doctors you're the odd one if you don't become one. A son of a brahmana, a religious leader, guru, inherits the followers of his dad. Thus exist political dynasties, professional dynasties, religious dynasties. Nowadays dynasty is almost always immediately a derogatory term. And it must be so. The hero's son turned out to be not so heroic at all; the doctor's son really wanted to be a butcher; and the pastor's son was a charlatan. The reason is simple: it is based on the false identification of the body as being the self. The self and the body are different, just as a driver and a car are. the self, not the body, possesses the qualities of holiness, heroism, kindness, as well as cruelty, lasciviousness, greed, etc. you may inherit your father's body color or shape, or even his mental capacity, but not your father's humility, or how he cares about other people. It's sad that this scam based on blood has been going on since history. It has been so long occurring that people dismiss it as an inherent trait. Ganyan na talaga tayo. But the reason i think is so simple. we are scammed not because we are idiots or lazy, but because we don't know the truth about ourselves, we don't know who we are, what we are.

The Math of Happiness

The number of people who hates a truly happy person doesn't matter, what matters is how many people he hates: zero. The number of people who loves a happy person doesn't matter, what matters is how many people he loves: every single one. 

May we all be truly happy. Haribol! _/\_

THE NAME GAME

I have always told my daughter Radha that God has many Names even before she started going to school. One can call Him Allah, Jehova, Yahweh, Krishna, El Shadai, or simply Father, Friend, or God. I especially emphasized to her that God has many Names, and not many gods. To have many gods defeats the very meaning of God. When she started taking a "religion class" in elementary, we started having a minor theological issue. Apparently her religion teacher does not agree with the idea of God having a lot of names (millions, I told her initially, but in fact the Names are enumerable, as The Supreme has countless qualities, activities, etc.), the teacher insisted that God only has a particular name, and that name is the only name of God. My wife told me to drop the issue and refrain from indoctrinating our daughter with "weird, new age stuff" at least after Radha finishes her "religion subjects". Radha got an almost perfect score in her "religion subject" exam, so her mother was relieved. I'm not, however, due to a few things. Things like religious wars or wars related to religion, that is actually rooted in in this particular disagreement: The Name of God. Some people worship God because of His compassion, and so they call Him Allah; some are attracted to His might so they call Elohim and El Shaddai; God is all-attractive so He is called Krishna. God is not many. There is no such thing as the God of the Christians and the God of the Muslims, or the Jews and the Hindus. If you call out Allah, referring to some tribal god, then that is NOT the name of God, but if one calls out Allah, meaning the all-compassionate God, then that IS God. It's funny some people can have three to five names, nicknames, etc. but God can only have one or two. I myself, an insignificant dot in the universe have the arrogance to call myself in five to six names, and the Lord can have only have one name. I still tell my daughter the many Names of God, although I have to work doubly hard to scrape away the bigotry she got from school (ironically!). It is sad to think that because God has many Names it gave way to many religions, and from those religions sects and denominations, all claiming their's is the exclusive name of the Lord. Haribol

September 8, 2015

Today is my father's 4th disappearance anniversary. Someone asked if we're going to visit, meaning go to the cemetery. I answered "He's not there." 

But i have to admit that saying that requires mental effort. the conditioned mind, which is so used to identifying the person, my dad in this case, as this short frail guy who looks like Rudy Fernandez, resists to let go of the idea. 

thinking about it i realized that the visiting of the remains, bones and hair and some rotting flesh, is our helpless attempt to cling on to something when pictures and memories fail to fill up the void left by sorrow and lamentation. so if that would hush someone's sadness for a while i have nothing against it. i may even go and light a candle for the sake of familial camaraderie. 

but i choose to cling on to something real. believing that the person is inside that sarcophagus or pantson or whatever for me is blind faith. you have to convince yourself he is there for it is maddening to try to figure out where the person is. let's convince ourselves he is inside that cement box resting in peace. and this candle will be our loving remembrance of him translated into matter. after that we go home pacified ourselves with the thought that we have visited dad in his new address ie land of the dead. then we can go on with our lives. 

I believe he is not there. what's there are what he left. my father was not these bones, or his name on the tombstone. he was part of these yes but after he left these just became exactly what they always were: matter. i mean there won't be much of a difference if i take out all his clothes and light a candle around it, i mean thats less gross than putting candles around his bones right? 

my father is not inside that box is not faith, it's science, it is truth. it's same as saying that he is not his old t shirts and socks and neck ties, he used these but he is not these. this is a long subject and ill jump to the point: i liberated myself from sadness and lamentation by remembering the absolute truth that my father is not his dead body, that he is the person, the spiritual spark of life inside that body. of course I miss him so much but it is not enough to drive myself crazy and talk to the dead ie stone, bone, carcass. because my father never died, he just left his body, that's all. he is somewhere very much existing and alive. i know i may not see him again but that's life in this world: for one who is born death is certain. so there. 

let me close this with a powerful verse from the sacred Bhagavad Gita imparted to me by my spiritual guide Jagad Guru Siddhaswarupananda Paramahamsa Prabhupad to whom i am endlessly grateful for pulling me out of the well of lamentation over the death of my father and the inevitable coming deaths of loved ones:

the Supreme Personality of Godhead Sri Krishna said:

"Never was there a time when I did not exist, nor you, nor all these kings; nor in the future shall any of us cease to be."

BG v 2 chap 12. 

Jai Gurudev. Haribol! _/\_

A Rose

Everything came from nothing, randomness or chaos, has been the long standing conclusion of science regarding the origin of anything, including life in our universe. As we know it--as they know it. Everything we see in this world came from nothing. Everything just happened to happen. I've thought about it for the longest time, and when I'm in the sterile box of my room full of black and white words on squares it seems to make sense in my mind. But then I see this rose with its layers of intricate petals arranged in a pattern so organized you'd think a machine so complex beneath the ground had manufactured it, that I always return to my heart that says there's got to be someone so supremely intelligent, cool and creative who designed and made that. Come to think of it: everything or most things in this world that supposedly came from chaos or disharmony have harmony, symmetry, patterns: the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, wet and dry season, a woman's menstrual cycle, planting and harvesting, the veins on leaves, the tides, our very aging, birth and death, over and over, again and again, patterns everywhere. If chaos or randomness, had created this rose, then perhaps I can imitate randomness by tearing down this rose, plucking out all its petals, leaves, thorns, etc., put these parts in a box and shake it until all the parts, petals, stem, thorns, scent, fall in the right place and form themselves into a rose. The question then would be how long should I be shaking that box. How many years, centuries or millennia of shaking that box full of petals, leaves, etc., would it take anyone to create one decent rose that the humble earth grows effortlessly? The probability is so slim that I can confidently say it's impossible. I mean, taking randomness aside, who among us or even our brightest scientists who dared explain the universe, with everything our latest technology can offer create a rose just like that? 

Love For God and Others

First and foremost, I humbly offer all my respects to my spiritual teacher, Jagad Guru Siddhaswarupananda Paramahamsa Prabhupad, who thought me what real love is. Without Him, I know nothing. I also offer my respects to all the saintly teachers, especially Lord Jesus Christ who declared that one must love God, the Supreme Father with all our heart, mind and entire being. And like unto it love His other children.

Love for others must come from love for God. It is the natural way. Some people claim that they can love others without even believing in the existence of God, but eventually they should be able to come to the point of asking what or who gives them the joy of loving. Did it come from love, which is a vague and abstract idea or entity? Did we make ourselves happy? Did those whom we had helped made us happy? Can we even make ourselves happy only by sheer will power? If so then why do we have to get out of our way to find happiness in loving others?

The conclusion of saintly teachers is this: when God is pleased with us we experience sublime joy. When we are loving His children, God, the Father of all living entities, is pleased with us and we experience joy.

Love for God must come first, as declared by Lord Jesus Christ, because it is the proper way. As rain can be produced by seeding clouds, the natural process of evaporation and precipitation, as conducted by nature, is far more superior. Thus, we can make believe that we are loving others even without loving God, but such “love” and the concept of “others” is dubious. Without love for God, so-called love for others is driven by different things. It could be out of anything: pity, patriotism, loneliness, hunger for glory and fame, self-righteousness, etc. And this so-called love is directed to many different concepts of “others.” “Others” may refer to a certain type of race, species, name, form, color, denomination, etc. That’s why we have patriots who love others i.e. their countrymen, collected as a nation. We have environmentalists who love others i.e. whales, pandas, gorillas, etc. We have so-called public servants who love others i.e. their constituents or possible voters. We have philanthropists who love others i.e. living entities in human form.

When it is said that God is the Father of all living entities, it means all living entities regardless of physical differences of form, color, species, political boundaries, etc. God, being the Father of all living entities, naturally loves each and every single one of His children in whatever form they are in (whether they are inside a body of a maggot or the president of a country). Love for others therefore is to love every single one of God’s children. To appreciate this, we must be able to see God as our Father, and we must be able to see others as our brothers. But to actually achieve this love for others, we must be able, not only to see, but to actually love God as our Father in order for us to actually love His children as our brothers. This is simple science. This is real love for others without boundaries. This is love beyond the material garb of the living entity which is inside a certain body. At the same time this is also knowing the real identity of the other person, that he is not his body but the person inside the body.

One must be able to taste love for God to know the difference. Love for others in itself can offer a slight, albeit fleeting, taste of happiness or fulfillment to a person, but it can never compare to the happiness and satisfaction in loving others a lover of God feels. In fact, one just needs to love God, and love for others automatically follows. One cannot love God and hate others, one cannot factually love others while hating God. It is like separating wetness from water, it is not possible. When one is tasting love for God, his entire being is flooded with ecstasy. He becomes, just like a prism hit by a single ray of sunlight, an explosion of light. He sees everything in relation to his beloved; he sees His beloved in everything. An ant crawls up his foot, he does not see the little creature as a threat, instead he understands that this little fellow is a brother, a person like him caught in the web of birth and death. He sees everything animate and inanimate as his Lord’s property, thus he does not use them for his own selfish motives, instead he tries to engage them in the loving service of his Lord. This is love for God, this is love for others founded upon love for God.

My teacher said: A person can only be truly happy, truly satisfied when he is tasting love for God (and from that, love for others). The easiest way to come to the transcendental platform of love for the Lord is by regularly hearing and chanting His Holy Names, Gopala, Govinda, Rama, Madana-Mohana, Krishna, Allah, Jehova, etc. Haribol!

There are no roaches in America

I was a kid when I heard from someone that in America there are no rats or roaches. That it was a very clean place, you can almost lick the sidewalks. Being a little older than me, and a boy who is cool enough to already wear trousers, I took the person who said this as an authority and his statement as truth. And for a long time I believed it as all in all. Eventually when the dazzling effulgence of coolness diminished and I being a trouser-wearing kid myself, I found out the “real” truth. But to give that person the benefit of a doubt of being just a complete liar, I think he was only able to come up with that statement because his actual experience of America was of a theme park where his parents took him for a trip. The place was in America alright, and true enough the park had no rats or roaches and the mock sidewalks seem to have just been painted the other day. So given these givens, my man concluded that yes, America is so clean. Having limited vision, not to mention limited brain power, there’s no way for him of knowing what is outside the theme park. That in fact just a few meters from the park entrance there is a water drain and underneath it is an ecosystem of six legged and four legged species of vermin. And being distracted by the goodies he got from the gift shops the real grimy sidewalks outside escaped his attention. As far as the limits of his human facility, what he reported was all the truth he can muster. But it is not the actual truth, just because he said it. His imperfect senses are not the proper vessels of the truth, so what he professed cannot be accepted, in other words it is false. Absolutely, America is not a clean place, and America has rats and roaches, and if you want to lick its sidewalks be my guest. 

In the big league there still are those who play as cool, trouser-wearing men among trouser-wearing men.  These guys love to tell you truths they gathered from big kids’ theme parks, accessible only by rocket ships and telescopes on mountain tops. Like my childhood friend, they never seem to lay off the habit of saying “there’s nothing there.” “No roaches and rodents here. Yes, sir. If there were, I should’ve seen them by now.” So they tell us, wide-eyed kids on old men’s trousers: “There is no God. Only human determination.”  And we nod, because they are so cool with their messy hair and spectacles with lenses thick as an electron microscope. Nobody is smart enough to ask: have you guys been to every part of the universe, and actually saw everything? Have you guys even ever been to every single place in the planet earth? But we give our faith to Mr. Science Man. I mean, how can you doubt? Is it even possible that a shred of lie can come out of a leather-bound science book written by PHD such and such?  And when someone expresses it in formulas isn’t that synonymous with The Truth? And the truth can’t be wrong right? Because they are scientists, they are disciples of Science, and science means truth. They invented the gadam computer right, and the computer is never wrong. And I heard science can explain everything, including why the moon is not made of green cheese. Scientists, I heard never tell a lie, it’s like their secret code, a creed of honesty. What they see is what they profess. They have such perfect vision thanks to their very scientific spectacles. But what about this book that says about everything being created by someone? What about that? I have a whole stack of creation stories in my private libe, under the mythic nonsense category.  Jesus, the truth, the way and the life, who is that? It’s like these silly books saying Odin will slay frost giants, and I’ve not seen frost giants. I mean is there even evidence that Jesus is a real person, come on. Show me. Epics. Myths. Mine is a science book, yours is a story book. Are you willing to build your life upon some Homer of the Far east? There’s no God, if there is, show me. Show me if there are roaches in America, show me a filthy American sidewalk. I dare you. And we do a standing ovation in some big hall in Sweden. Well said Mr. Science Man, I give you my heart and soul (oh, wait, there is no such thing as soul). We sleep soundly at night, dreaming “There’s nothing out there.” And we live peacefully in life shutting our eyes seeing nothing. Just simply living, and then dying and become nothing. The end.

Happy Father's Day Bastard

There's a bully at school and his name is Science. Actually that's just what's written on his name plate--a nickname--for his real name is Nescience. He thinks he knows and understands me and thus judges and criticizes me by calling me names. Big Bang Baby. The Great Accident. Primodial soup boy. Etc. He especially looks forward to this day just to say to my face "Happy father's day, bastard." He theorized that because he never saw my Father during Family days, PTA meetings, school affairs (only my mother attends) I must be fatherless. I must have just popped up inside my mother's womb from an accidental collision of dead matter which somehow became life. And that's why he thinks it's funny. I am an accident of chance. That's what he believes. And that's what he tells other kids. So they all call me bastard. But no one except my mother will ever know who my father is. Only my mother can factually tell if he exists or not. She knows who he is, where he lives, what he looks like, what his name is. No matter how hard Science tries to look in this school, in every family occasion he will never know or even see my father. For even if he appears in front of him, Science cannot know my father. He is so convinced he absolutely understands my father's non-existence. 

As much as you love yourself

Jesus Christ said that the first and foremost commandment is that we love God, our Father, with all our heart, mind, and entire being. And second is that from that love, we should also love His other children. 

This is the essence of all spiritual teachings: Love God and love others. It should be in this exact order. Love God is  first and foremost, and love others is the second commandment. Jesus did not arrange these two commandments according to this sequence without reason. The ordering is most important. One has to love God first, before he can factually love others. When one is loving God, he automatically loves others. But loving others alone cannot bring one to the point of love for God. And without tasting actual happiness of love for God one cannot love others in the truest sense. There are those who consider themselves humanists, another term for atheist, who do a lot of humanitarian work but does not love, or even believe, in God. They claim they can love others even without the need for a god. Whether their love for others is genuine or not is not for me to judge. I leave this issue for our brother atheist-humanist and death to discuss, when the truth will be resolved and revealed. 

To factually love others, one has to realize what they need; to give them what they really need we must know what will make them happy; to know what can make them really happy, we must know what they really are. The truth is revealed by saintly teachers and supported by scriptures: our true identity is spirit; we are not our body, we are not our mind; we are parts and parcels of the Supreme Spirit, God; our position is the dominated; and our function is to render loving service. When we know this then we can appreciate our connection to God and His children. It is said that God is the Supreme Father of every single living entity, from the highest being down to the lowly ant. Therefore every living entity, all life for that matter, is our kin. They are all children of God. Undoubtedly, acting upon concern for others is a laudable act. It is in a way pleasing to God. That explains the happiness we get out of loving. When God is pleased with us we experience joy, when God is displeased with us we experience misery. 

For most of us, "others" refer to different things. Usually, it signifies blood relations, the parents, siblings of our bodies, extending at most to further degrees of body kinship, cousins, etc. These are the easiest "others" to love. Naturally, for in fact they are not really "others" per se but merely the extensions of this form which we call our "self." My father, my brother, my dog, my lawn. Have you ever experienced that instance when you felt hurt when someone scratched your car? As if the car is a part of your body. You scratched me! You bumped me! So on. That's basically what I'm talking about. This chain of "my" can even progress beyond blood relations, into my friends, my classmates, my teammates, my workmates, my neighbor, my doctor, my townmate, so on. "If you mess with my BFF, you're messing with me." It seems so easy to love others as long as these "others" are in some way part of our little chain: my others. If Ms. Houston would allow me to correct her song, I'd sing "learning to love yourself is the easiest love of all." My fellow countrymen, my fellow females, my fellow brown skin. Yes, our idea of love for others may rise so high, farthest in bodily relation from our so-called self that we may think "look how unrelated I am to this famished boy, yet I am feeding him from my own hands." But at the back of our head our mind is saying, he is my same species, he is still within the chain of my  "others". 

And what is our reward for this gesture, aside from feeling good and proud about oneself? If we only got ourselves to please, then we have the commendation, the gratitude, the admiration and worship of people for us to relish. For most who help, that becomes the source of happiness. That is why in this world, it seems necessary to give away thousands of awards, titles and medals for kindness, charity, and so-called selfless activities even when in truth if we really are loving, simply the love should've been itself the prize. Will charitable institutions help anonymously? That's  perhaps the reason why they have names, right? (And there are those issues about scams regarding philanthropy, but that's a different subject.) Except for exploiting humanitarian work for profit, to be concerned like this is, of course, way better than not feeling concern at all. In times of desperation, we are not really so much into the means but with the result. And all kinds of humanitarian acts, irregardless of for whom it was performed, are most welcome, and necessary. 

One may ask: if naturally we can feel concern only for those within the chain of our body extensions, why not just expand our circle until everyone is in it? Then we'll be concerned for everyone. Even if that is possible, this kind of love, irregardless whether for a few relatives or thousands of displaced storm survivors, if it still remains in the chain of my others, is still dependent on certain things: Conditions. Even between intimate relations, there are certain conditions that determine so-called love: If she continues to act according to what is acceptable behavior to you then you love your wife, if he continues to provide you with your needs then you love your husband, if they continue to understand your need for independence then you love your parents, etc. This is what we call conditional love. A love based on "if"s. A love whose only concern is one person, himself. This is Whitney Houston philosophy after all: "the greatest love of all is to love oneself." As opposed to what saintly teachers preach: Love God, love others.  Now, some people deserve the benefit of a doubt. And for those who give away selflessly, no awards, no TV cameras, just giving for the sake of goodness, then we take our hats off. But if one actually loves God, he will have this vision that all living entities, not just humans, are spirit souls, parts and parcels of God. He will then realize that we have a common Father, therefore every being, other than ourselves, or the extensions of ourselves, is a relative, brother, kin. If he gets this vision of who he really is, and who others really are, and what relationship we have with our common Father, then there's no need to artificially take everyone in our circle of concern. If we are seeing every living entity as spirit soul, children of God, then the love and concern comes naturally. The difference is plain simple: in the first one, the center is God; in the other the center is you. 

And how exactly is it to love others? To simply give away food and clothing after a storm? To help someone change a tire? To be concerned out of pity. Yes, these are all good. Like I've said a little kindness is way better than a lot of meanness. But by our kindness are we really giving the ultimate goodwill to a person in need? Are we addressing the real need of a person? It seems that the answer will always revert to the truth of our identity: we must know who we are. We are spirit souls, parts and parcels of God. What we need is spiritual food, to taste an exchange of love with the Supreme Soul. No matter how much help we give to a person, if that help is simply directed to the body, the relief one gets from that is just a band aid solution. It is a relief, a gasp of air while drowning, but it will not last. Give him relief food, he'll eat for a day. We need food, shelter and all the basics, and by all means these must be provided. But we have to remember that simply providing these things will make someone happy for a awhile, but a profound hunger still gnaws in his heart: he is unsatisfied, lonely, empty. He needs a shelter which no storm can bring down. No amount of material thing can satisfy the soul. So if one plans to take the path of happiness by material means, then the road ahead of him is not only long, it is not only endless, but its fruitless. 

Love God, love others, all the saintly teachers agree is the real path to real happiness. And loving others here should not only be referred to as humanitarian work. Like what was previously said, it is not even supposed to be exclusive to living entities inside a human body only. But love as what it really means. A love that is beyond conditions, a love that is beyond material bodily considerations. Love for others here is a love that surfaces not only after storms or calamities, but it endeavors everyday to get everyone out of the greatest calamity of all time: suffering birth, old age, disease, and death. It is a love that has been always there in our hearts, sleeping, covered by a false love that is merely love for one's self. This love is our very essence. 

Simply put, my teacher taught, real love for others is loving them at least as much as how you love yourself. This may not be so easy as it sounds. It is actually setting aside your own wellbeing for the wellbeing of others. It is demoting yourself from first to last place. Now how easy it is to sacrifice one's place in the rat race? As easy as how anger or envy shoots up when someone takes your seat, or your job or your lover. Loving others is a vast ocean to cross, but when we are already loving God, then love for others is achieved as easy as crossing over a puddle made from a calf's hoof-print.