Imagine being the last human being alive. The city is quiet, devoid of sounds familiar to you. Everyone you know, everyone who speaks your language, everyone who looks remotely like you-- all gone. Scary, isn't it? Almost sounds like a plot from an apocalyptic science fiction movie. The question is: how did it get to that point?
In part, this is already happening, not to human beings at the moment; in fact, we are overpopulated. But we are doing this to other beings, other animals, other species. It is said that the normal rate of species disappearing is about one in one million in a course of one year. And yet, at the current rate we're going, because of how forests are cleared for animal agriculture, because endangered species are hunted and not protected, because of the fishing industry that is wiping out the oceans, we are now looking at 50% of all species being wiped out in about 100 years' time. Again: how did we get to this point? To examine our reality, we have to examine what underlies the manifestation of this reality. Before a yoga mat is made, someone had to think of the idea or the concept of this yoga mat. It boils down to the intention, the perception, the vision of that creation. Going back to the problem of mass extinction, let's frame it with this collective norm that we now have, the vision in which the world is built. According to corporate law, corporations are persons. And yet, beings like fish or dolphins or cows or eagles are not considered persons. When we live in a world where inanimate objects are given more personhood than sentient beings, we see where priorities lie. Hence, it is no surprise that companies are flourishing at the expense of other beings they do not consider persons, and consequently, our environment. What does awareness about the environment have to do with yoga? The short answer is: everything. The practice of yoga is to see that we are not separate from the environment, we are not separate from animals, that we are all parts of one whole unit. Notice how when you breathe your ujayi breath, you might influence the person beside you to synchronize to your breath. Notice when someone shifts their position during meditation, you get distracted and have the urge to shift your position too. Nothing we ever do exists in isolation. We all affect each other. Even what we breathe is a result of the oceans breathing. When we come to terms with the scientific fact that 50% of the oxygen that we breathe comes from phytoplankton in the ocean, the yogic concept "we are connected" becomes a pragmatic reality. It is not just on an abstract level that we are connected, but on a very physical level. It is also humbling because while we may think it's the dominant species, namely us human beings, who are essential to survival, this could not be further from the truth. It's the small creatures that we often ignore who hold the key to our collective survival. For us to change our course, to survive and thrive as a whole, it is necessary that we see other beings as persons. Go back to the scenario of you being the last person on Earth. You automatically know you do not desire this kind of suffering for yourself. Now replace yourself with another person in the scenario, perhaps with someone you love, and you still know that this is not the kind of suffering you would inflict on others. Keep replacing this person with another person and another person, until you include all beings in all the world belonging to all species. When you are able to feel within your heart that this should not happen to anyone, that you would do what you can to alleviate the suffering of others, then you have let go of that separation. Then you see all beings as persons. Then you are in a state of Yoga.
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When I wasn't vegan yet, when I didn't understand that animals are not ours to use, I had this pair of earrings made out of peacock feathers. I thought they were beautiful. I know better now, but back then, I was just drawn to the beauty of it like I would be drawn to a thing. I didn't see peacocks as beings. I didn't understand that those feathers didn't belong to me.
The focus of the month "What is a Person" may seem self-explanatory. And yet, when we dare to question our initial definition of personhood, we find that our perception is limited, our biases are the result of social conditioning, and that we have room to expand in terms of seeing personhood in others. I did a quick research on peacocks and found out a few interesting things about them. The peacocks refer to the males, but they don’t start growing their trains until age three. So while we were probably learning how to use a toilet at that age, they are starting to grow these beautiful feathers. Another thing is that when a peacock fans his train, his feathers emit a sound that is so low in frequency that we humans won't be able to hear it. And depending on whether they want to attract females from far away or up close, they can change the sound by shaking different parts of their feathers. They can also be quite manipulative. When peacocks mate with peahens, they give out a loud “copulatory call.” It is found out that as much as one third of the time, this sound is faked so they can appear more sexually active than they were and attract more females. If we get to know other beings, we will find that the world they live in has their own quirks and complexities, rules and codes, they move according to what they understand, not what we necessarily understand. And it doesn't matter if they were peacocks or chickens or ants or crocodiles or turkeys or horses, other beings live according to the world that they perceive. However different their worlds are from ours is not a reflection of a lack in their personhood; it is merely a reflection of our lack in understanding. What is a person? A person is any sentient being, and to respect their personhood is give them their freedom, to not take anything of theirs, not their feathers or fur or skin, not their flesh or eggs or secretions, and most certainly not their lives. A person's life belongs to that person; it doesn't belong to me. One important way of honoring the personhood of all beings is to be vegan. It is the compassionate expression of respecting all of life. There are times that being a person may feel like it's too much that it wears us down, and the confusion and frustration and sense of helplessness can be overwhelming. During these times, we may point to the outside world, to an "other" and blame them for the state we are in. This "other" could be another person-- our partner, our mother, our child, our boss, our competitor, our president etc-- or another group of persons-- the government officials, the ones who voted for a particular person, a group of minorities whom we see as "weak" and somehow not as intelligent or sensible or (ironically) as compassionate as us. Left unexamined, our anger and hatred during trying times towards this "other" can destroy us, perhaps not right away, but a little bit at a time. It can destroy our hope, our enthusiasm, our faith, our peace of mind.
As yogis, our practice is to go deeper and explore what's underneath these symptoms: grief, pain, a sense of loss. We are faced with what seems to feel like collective grief, and seeing "others" not as persons merely adds to the collective anger. There is a tool that every single person can use to ground down. This tool also helps us see the simplicity in what appears to be complex. This tool is the breath, and the observance of this breath. The breath is the breath. It is neutral and yet it is the very basic function of life that sustains us. It is what we share with all persons. As you quiet down the breath, take a moment to let the fact sink in that you are breathing in the molecules of the breath of other persons. We are literally breathing each other. The breath does not discriminate, does not demonize, does not blame, does not hold grudges. The breath is equal opportunity in providing sustenance. By practicing yoga, we may think of ourselves as "spiritual", and yet my teacher Sharon Gannon reminds us that a spiritual being is anyone who breathes. One way that we can let go of our negative feelings towards "others" is to see them as spiritual beings like us, that is, they breathe just like us, they live just like us, they want to be free just like us. When the weight of the world feels heavy, when we feel lost, when we are overwhelmed by the suffering we see, we breathe. And through this breath that is connected to others, we work on finding peace. I have a friend who was considering getting a tattoo, and he thought he might get a serial number tattooed on him, the same number that was tattooed on his grandmother. It wasn't her choice to have that number. It was the number assigned to her when she was sent to the concentration camp. She is a holocaust survivor.
The focus of the month is the question: What is a person? It seems obvious enough that a question need not be asked. But throughout history and even in the world as it is now, persons have been deduced to less than persons. During the holocaust, persons were assigned numbers like bar codes, treated like resources and slaves, things to be discarded. One might say it doesn't happen now, and yet sadly it does. In the Philippines, we are given the stats of how many drug pushers and drug users there supposedly are, and we are told the poorest victims of this war on drugs are killed because they are "low-hanging fruits" and the innocent nothing more than "collateral damage". All over the world, nonhuman animals are treated like things, slaughtered by the billions every year, their consciousness and awareness completely disregarded. We as a human race have been deducing persons to "less than" in many different ways. One group feels more superior to another group, and this disconnection comes out in these expressions: sexism, misogyny, heterosexism, racism, speciesism etc. And as long as there is disconnection, we will keep putting down the other as "just a Jew" or "just a woman" or "just a drug user" or "just an animal", we will keep being at war with ourselves, and we will keep destroying each other. The way out of this war, both internal and external, is to start experiencing your own personhood. This soul that has arrived in this particular body in this particular lifetime with this particular set of circumstances make up the person that you are. This is you. You are a person. You matter. When you fully embrace this, you see this same personhood in others, as they have arrived in their particular bodies in their particular sets of circumstances. They are persons. They matter. And then, no matter what numbers or figures or statistics we are bombarded with, we see persons as persons, not as things, not as machines, not as trash, not as property, not as slaves. And no matter how similar or different they are from us, we see persons as persons, not to be used, not to exploited, not to be abused, and not to be killed. A person exists in any being who breathes and lives, and all persons deserve happiness and freedom. Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu. May all persons be happy. May all persons be free. I read about this family who moved and left behind what they didn't want to take with them. In the picture of what they left are a mattress, part of a bed frame, a small cabinet, and a dog. The abandoned dog stayed with the garbage for days, waiting for the humans to return. It's easy for us to spot that the dog, being a living being, is different from the things left behind. The dog has awareness and the ability to feel, just like us. But the humans treated him as no more than as a thing, discarded when no longer wanted.
The Jivamukti focus of the month is "What is a Person?" Our conventional definition may include only human beings as persons. Is this definition sufficient? If it is, why is it that the abandoned dog being treated more like a thing than a person doesn't sit right with us? Let's probe further. What makes personhood? Is it intelligence? Well, some human beings are mentally incapacitated, but we still agree that they are persons. Furthermore, animals too are quite intelligent. Pigs are as smart as 3-year-old human children. Birds migrate with weather conditions. Is it then the ability to have emotional bonds? Mother cows are as connected to their babies as humans do. When they are separated from their babies, as it happens in the dairy industry, they wail endlessly in anguish. Is it then moral compass? There's this experiment where they tested monkeys. They starve the monkeys and will only give them food if they push a button to conduct an electric shock to other monkeys. Majority of the monkeys chose to starve than to hurt others, especially if they themselves have been recipients of the shock. So what makes us say that only human beings are persons if human beings and animals are not significantly different when it comes to intelligence, emotions, and moral compass? The expressions of those intelligence and emotions and morality may be different, but they are present across the board. How we assign personhood then boils down only to our perception. We treat animals as things not because they are things, but because of a failure on our part to see beyond speciesism. Yoga practice has the power to change this perception. As we become more attuned to our soul, the less attached we become to outside appearances, and the more we are able to recognize the divinity in all beings, be this being a dog or a dolphin, a crow or a chicken, a goat or a grasshopper. As we always say, may all beings everywhere be happy and free. May we refer to all beings as all beings, and not limited to our preferred perceptions of that personhood. The next time you practice, offer your intention to a person whose personhood you previously did not acknowledge. It is through our open mindedness and expansion of the heart that we will start to mean "all beings" when we say "all beings". Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu. |
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