Part of animal rights activism is seeing how disconnected people can be. One time, I saw online that someone was laughing at an animal suffering, and my reactions were of anger, frustration, and ultimately pain. When I took a look at who this person was, I found out that he had posted pictures of him cutting himself again and again across his forearm. I realized then that his own suffering was immense, that he had to numb himself, rendering him unable to empathize with the animal in pain.
Sometimes I think the world is like a stack of dominoes, and the pain of one, if it is not healed, if it consumes the person, then gets passed on to the other, and the other, and the other. And by passing on our pain, we all fall. My teacher Sharon Gannon says in her essay that the word perception means "to see". But it's more than seeing with the physical eyes. It's also more than just understanding. It's to realize. When we perceive the world in the light of love, when someone challenges our sensitivities or says or does something hurtful to us or the ones we care about, we no longer need to be consumed in anger or vengeance. We begin to understand that the person inflicting pain on others is himself or herself in pain. We develop compassion. This does not mean we become willing victims and we put ourselves in situations for others to abuse us. Compassion means we stand firm and strong, and we wish instead for the happiness and freedom of those who suffer. One of the ways we can develop compassion is to see the person who hurt us as a child. He or she was once a child who merely wanted to be loved, to feel secure and safe. Somewhere between then and now, he or she experienced pain, and he or she didn't know how to deal with it, and he or she ended up hurting others, including us. To realize this is to have the beginnings of forgiveness. If in our mind we are still holding on to a balance sheet of what this person should say or do or change or ask or apologize for, not only are we keeping them captive, but we are also holding on to the pain and setting it up for it to be passed on. In the light of love, we can set this person free from what we think he or she owes us. In the light of compassion, we can let go of the heaviness that weighs down at us. In the light of understanding, we see that we are essentially the same, living this life pursuing happiness and avoiding pain. Let us learn to stand firm and steady and strong, such that when others try to pull us down, our compassion continues to hold us up. And then we do not need to receive suffering. And then we do not need to pass on the suffering. And then we break the cycle of pain and violence.
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This Life. We are just letting consciousness play.
--- We are all already here. The party has arrived. We were all here from the very beginning. And we will all be here until the "end". Except there is no end. It's just a party. And the party has arrived. We are not waiting for anyone. We are all going to be here. All of eternity. All of us. Whether you like it or not. We are just going to keep changing. There is no "resolution". And that's why it's funny. Because it is all already here. Yes! In this party that has arrived! We are going to keep transforming. So we will never exactly be the same. But we will always exist. And we will always exist all together. All of us. The comedy is that there is no plot. No secret surprise. No side twist. It's all just here. And it's really all just a party. We are just having fun. Playing with who we can be. Playing with what we can do. Because we have already arrived. We are everything. Arrived. Us. --- Everyone tried to paint their own pictures. And put it into their own words. What living inside this mind is like. And they are all true. And they are all perfect. And they are all correct. Who has suffered from the affliction of pride? Perhaps you were having a conversation with someone, and you said something, held a particular point of view. And as the conversation turned into an argument, you heard less and less of what the other person had to say because you are more and more concerned about proving your own point. And perhaps there was a point in time you realize what the other person is saying made a lot of sense, but because you have defended your own position for so long, you are unwilling to admit that maybe you are changing your mind a little bit. I think it happens to all of us at least sometimes.
But what's the use of being so high up in our throne, holding on to old ways of thinking and doing, just so we could continue to keep an identity we've invested so much time in? You see, we all have made mistakes. We all have said something insensitive. We all have hurt others. And no matter how hard we try, we will continue to make mistakes in the future. Because we are human! But we can respond differently to our mistakes, to our pride, to our need to be right and validate ourselves. We can let go of all of that, and through loving kindness, be willing to change! Most of us are familiar with the song "Amazing Grace". Do you know that there's a beautiful story of change and redemption behind this song? The song was written by John Newton, a British slave trader. For many years, he sold human slaves because it was legal and normal and acceptable. He held on to that view and take the same actions for many years. On a homeward journey, a violent storm hit, and he would later refer to this point in time as his "deliverance". And although it wasn't until much later that he renounced the slave trade, when he did, he owned up to the full horror of it. In the song, there's a line that goes "I once was lost, but now am found". When we open ourselves to the light of love, when we shift our perspective, magic happens. When we change our minds, what we lose is not our true identity, but only a false sense of self. And like the song said, we don't lose ourselves for being open, we in fact find ourselves. We begin to see. Early last month, I attended a talk at Asia Yoga Conference with a teacher named Carlos Pomeda. I wanted to take his class because the first time that I did, 4 years ago, something about his presence moved me. It wasn't the content of his talk, it wasn't what he taught, but it was his presence itself. So there I was, at a 2pm class, and I was a really "bad" student. I dozed off because I was so sleepy after lunch, when I woke up, I kept drinking water so I won't fall asleep again, which meant at some point in the lecture I had to go to the bathroom past other students and come back. I am sure he knew I was distracted and wasn't completely present, because the lecture was held in a theater-style room where he could see everything. At one point, before he was about to give the meditation instructions, a couple of students stood up to leave, walking right past him. And he said, completely without sarcasm, without ego, and with lightness and humor I might say, "Are you escaping?" And he waved them goodbye. That to me, was a great teaching. The way he handled errant students like me and the others was a testament of what it is like to be unattached, what I could be like if I were enlightened. Because he allowed me to be with my struggles, because he held the space for me, he gave me the gift of believing in enlightenment, because of how he was.
The focus of the month is called "In the Light of Love", and I felt during those few hours that I took this teacher's class, that his being is lit up with so much love that it touched me too. It made me understand that love is not a raging emotion of attachment, but the quiet acceptance of others as they are. In the light of love, we accept the struggles and so-called imperfections of others. In the light of love, we hold space for ourselves and others to grow. In the light of love, we are kind even when we or others struggle in each our own paths. To be born into this world of sensations is an explosion. To feel that we are solid for the first time, to wear a layer of flesh over bones, to hear the sounds that create patterns, to see patterns that create colors, to absorb colors that create all of those dimensions we cannot even begin to explore, multiple universes beyond what we've ever known-- is to be initiated into this life for the first time.
We take this trip and we slowly forget where we came from, and we search and look, thinking there is a self out there, or that there is a "one" out there, a person or a god or an external meaning, an answer to all our questions. And we begin to take this search so seriously, and our role-- we forget that it is just a role. And we become ashamed of our nudity, the banality of our flesh, our hunger, and along with this shame we develop an intense need for validation, to be seen, to be heard, to be comforted, to be loved, to be touched, to be known. Except there is no one out there, because the "one" is in here, taking this trip alone. It has been and always will be our trip alone. It is MY trip alone, mine and mine alone to take. How beautiful, how intense, how even I cannot keep up with its vibrancy and theatrical colors and ever-changing hues-- this is my trip alone. If somewhere along this trip, our paths happen to have crossed, and you tapped my shoulder gently because you wanted my attention, you needed something from me, or you knew I needed something from you, and you wanted to come along for the ride a little while, know that I welcomed you, and I invited you, and that you are so dear for it, and I love you so much for it, but I cannot carry you with me, because this is my trip alone. I have to go on my trip as you have yours to take. For what seems like seconds in lieu of lifetimes, you were a part of me, so thank you, you are beautiful, and I love you. I know it was beautiful for you too. Interspersed in this trip we get glimpses of both our greatness and smallness, our oneness and our separation, and sometimes the joy is too much we want to share it, and other times the abandonment is too great we cannot bear it. But in those moments that we think we are alone, we are not. When we dig into the rawness of our suffering and we think we alone suffer, everyone feels it, all of the spirits, all of breaths of everyone who lives and who has ever lived and who is about to be born, we all feel it, and we are with each other. And so when you feel you are alone, you are not truly alone. We can all access what is already there, the pivotal point in time and space where everything exists at the same time in layers that overlap such that there is no more "other". It is not a secret and there are no guarded passwords and it is open to all. But to go back there is an explosion, and we are afraid it will be too much. But we are also gifted with glimpses. If we all understood just how beautiful our shared existence is, if we only knew we are the waves to each other's oceans, we would hold no one back, we would feel what they feel, we would know their suffering not because it is "like" our own, but because it is our own. Everyone's just trying to go on this trip alone. We have to take this trip alone, but we will also eventually realize all of our roads lead to that one road. It is all of life explained, all of death experienced, all those sensations for the first time remembered. And it is an explosion. There is no alone. There is all of us. Happening all at the same time. We are all of us all the time. There was never a separation. So it is that we have to take our trip alone. So we can remember. We. Are. Each. Other. In explosion. Sri Brahmananda Sarasvati, the teacher of my teachers, defines yoga as the state of missing nothing. Essentially, he was speaking of wholeness, completeness, and fullness. Most of us operate from a place of thinking we lack something, we miss something. We are missing a man or a woman, or a particular element in our relationship with this man or woman; we think we are missing fulfillment because we do not have this object or property or adventure; we think we are missing something in the present moment because we wish we could change the past or we wish we were already in the future. Much of how the world operates, how people act, is from a place of thinking they are missing something. People do not wake up and think "I'm going to make as many beings suffer as possible". But people act from a place where they mistakenly think they have a void to fill. They have identified with this void and use others, exploit others, kill others, steal from others, etc as an attempt to cover up what they think they are missing.
Yoga teaches us that we are already whole. When one is whole, it does not mean one becomes passive in the world. Quite the opposite. Whereas the actions of a person thinking they have a void to fill tend to be selfish in nature, the actions of a whole person tend to be selfless. Instead of taking, the whole person gives, offers up his or her life to service, sees where there may be suffering in the world and does his or her best to uplift it. We are all whole, and our job in our practice is to uncover those blockages that prevent us from seeing this. We may make excuses as to why we are not whole-- because we did this thing in the past, said that thing in the past, hurt others in the past, will continue to hurt others in the future. But wholeness does not mean perfection. Wholeness means that we are complete as we are, with no prerequisites or conditions to fulfill. When we accept our wholeness, we can look at the world with a better understanding. There is no such thing as "good" or "bad" people, only those who have embraced their wholeness and those who still mistakenly think they have a void they need to fill. Remember your true nature as a Holy Being, a complete soul missing nothing. When you change the way you look at yourself, the way you look at the world and treat everyone else start to change too. Whenever I tell someone I'm interested in going on float tanks or "sensory deprivation" tanks, there is usually either the reaction of fear or curiosity. The idea of not being able to see anything or hear anything is very unfamiliar to us. Understandably so. Our entire lives are built on experiences we have with our senses. We create memories with snippets of smelling baked bread, staring into the eyes of the ones we love, touching the soft fur of a beloved animal companion, hearing the pitter patter of rain falling into the roof, and so on.
To practice pratyahara (withdrawal of the senses) then is usually unchartered territory for most people. Why even do it? Are there any benefits? Or is it just an act of self-sacrifice and deprivation? What will we find when we let the outside world go as a temporary practice? When we direct the energy inwards instead of outwards, we will begin to understand the vast richness of our consciousness, that there is this space where the past and future are irrelevant, where worries and guilt and fear have no place, where we can simply surrender and let go. In the empty space, there is only the present moment, where everything is perfect, as they were meant to be. We live in a world designed almost counter to practicing pratyahara. We can spend hours online, or its sensory overload equivalent, we can spend our entire day at the mall. And then these are hours spent using our energy to absorb external experiences, and we are buried deeper and deeper into the cycle of looking outside for satisfaction-- which will never come. Through pratyahara practice, we do the opposite. We direct the energy inwards, we uncover the layers that hide our true identity, the unchanging reality of who we are that is not dependent on the chaos of the outside world. Through pratyahara, we find peace and discover we are that peace itself. |
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