The last time I was at an international airport, I had a funny little encounter during the immigration checks. The officer looked at my passport, then looked at me, and back at my passport, and said "You look at least ten years younger than your age." I smiled, maybe a little too smugly, and said "Well, that's because I'm vegan and I'm a yogi". We had a short chat about it and it felt good that I had the opportunity to talk about the things that are important in my life. The focus of the month for April is Forgetting and Remembering. The gist of this focus is that who we are is pure consciousness, though we had forgotten that and as yogis, we seek to remember it. It is, shall we say, not a usual topic for what we may consider everyday conversation. Imagine, for example, that I brought up this concept of forgetting and remembering during the airport conversation. Alternative Scenario 1 Immigration officer: You look at least ten years younger than your age. Me: Well, I am not my age. I am not my hair. I am not my body. I am not this vehicle we call a body. This identity is fake. I'm a pretender, a fraud, an illusion. If I had said this, they probably would have detained me because of my confession that I am using a "fake identity". Alternative Scenario 2 Immigration officer: You look at least ten years younger than your age. Me: Am I really ten years younger? What does that mean anyway? Who am I? Who is supposed to tell me who I am? If I had said this, they might have put me in a mental facility for my confused state and my "amnesia". Alternative Scenario 3 Immigration officer: You look at least ten years younger than your age. Me: Yes, that is because who I really am is eternal and boundless and timeless. I am the divine, the consciousness, the connection to all. If I had said this, they might suspect me of drug use and try to search me for drug trafficking. So, this idea of forgetting and remembering is not part of most people's everyday conversation, because most people are stuck in the forgetting part of the equation. We look at our passports and our driver's licenses and our company IDs and we think we are what these documents say who we are. From the time we are born, we are categorized. This is your name, this is your gender, this is how much you weigh, you are the child of so and so, and on and on it goes with the labeling, the mislabeling, the categorization, the limiting of our identity, and the attachment to that identity. Like David Life said in his essay, we are like children wearing Halloween costumes. Some of us pretend to be superheroes and others villains, some princesses and others monsters. We make believe until we fool ourselves into thinking that this is all that we are. But because we are in a safe place amongst yogis who ask the same questions, because we are in this satsang (a gathering of like-minded people), we could dare put the question forth of who we are. We can create space in our lives to ask this question: Can I remember who I am before everyone else told me who I am supposed to be? Be brave. Choose to let go of the social conditioning of forgetting and begin that search of remembering. Be bold. Choose to do the unexpected of awakening to the vastness of your true identity. Be your Self. Choose to strip away your charade of what you show to the world to remember that you are the one wearing that costume and you are not that costume. Let us remember. Let us walk down memory lane. Let us embrace who we are.
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