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. 

Goal of life

As laid down by past saintly teachers, such as Jesus Christ, the goal of life is so simple: Love God; Love others. 

When one has achieved this, there's nothing more to be gained. When the Supreme Lord is pleased with us, life is smooth. Problems will come, but one can overcome them like crossing over a puddle of water on a calf's hoof-print instead of a vast, turbulent ocean. 

This love can only be achieved by the mercy and guidance of a lover of God, the spiritual teacher, like Jesus, who is a well-wisher of all living entities, and who is therefore free of envy towards anyone. If we can realize our helplessness to disentangle ourselves from the miseries of material existence, and approach such teacher with humility and sincerity, then he'll be able to teach us the path of devotion, love for God, or bhakti. 

My teacher taught me that the easiest way to come to the platform of love for the Lord is by regularly hearing and chanting His Holy Names. 

There is only one God, but He has countless number of names like Krishna, Govinda, Jehovah, Allah, etc. All These Names are invested with all His transcendental potencies. In this present age of quarrel and confusion, the scriptures recommend the hearing and chanting of God's Holy Names as the only way to achieve the perfection of life which is love for God and love for others. 

Haribol! Chant the Holy Names of God!