As advertised in the teaser in earlier note, this is an outpouring of the over-excited brain that is smitten with some of the beautiful things it came across in last few days.
I have to go back to Feb this year when I was browsing books at SFO waiting for my flight to LA. These days I naturally walk to shelves that are marked Philosophy, Spirituality, Psychology. Already in a deep brooding mode, I thought this is not good. I need to give myself a break. With effort I diverted myself to Humor/Fiction. All right, Ive' all these Wodehouse books already. :-D. Then I forced myself to browse all the staff recommendations. Finally got to the Classics where usual favorites like Jane Austen failed to charm. One staff member had written a decent review on
God of Small Things and since it had been on my list forever, I picked it up. Whatever. I will get this over with. At checkout, I also picked up Buddha by Deepak Chopra which had sneaked into my thoughts through a corner of my eye.
I was able to get to it couple of weeks ago and quite liked it. I bet Mr Chopra was thinking about a future Hollywood movie, probably starring Richard Gere while writing it. Nonetheless, I was gripped by it and my own world started mapping onto Buddha's world - I found the trap of my own palace, Mara lurking behind every sense stimulus trying to find a crack to get into my head. I also found my own Asita.
Just to give you a flavour, here are some random quotes:
"There is one thing Mara (the Devil) can never let you find out: the truth about who you really are." -
"Whatever can run can also stand still"
"Learn to use your memories... Don't let them use you."
"...you can be whole, but only if you see yourself that way. There is no holy life. There is no war between good and evil. There is no sin and no redemption. None of these things matter to the real you. But they all matter hugely to the false you, the one who believes in the separate self. You have tried to take your separate self, with all its loneliness and anxiety and pride, to the door of enlightenment. But it will never go through, because it is a ghost."
"Every particle of soil, every plant and animal, is constantly changing. You cannot be enlightened as the separate person you see yourself to be because that person has already disappeared, along with everything else from yesterday"
"Every single life is woven into the web of karma, which has no beginning or end. Until you accept that every life is woven into every other, you will never know who you really are."
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About the same time, Netflix delivered
Siddhartha, a random movie I had added to the queue months ago. I was super-happy about the coincidence and was looking forward to see all the scenes in Buddha's life on-screen. Happily sat down one night expecting to see a picture of 'Saffron-Robed Buddha-in-Meditation contrasted with a Handsome-Warrior-Prince' on the main menu. I was so sure about what I was going to see that it took me few minutes to comprehend when I clicked the remote and saw charming Shashi Kapoor in gerua and long wavy hair! Don't get me wrong, I love Shashi Kapoor, am a sucker for his charming smile (♥) but him as Buddha?? I mean, this is going to traumatize me for life. He is not tall, he has no oval Buddha face....what's wrong with these people? I hurriedly read the synopsis on the back of the cover. It said that this is a story of a young Indian who embarks upon a journey to find the meaning of existence - based on the novel by Hermann Hesse. Okay, I felt better. Let's see what this is about or just ogle at Shashi Kapoor!
I was rendered speechless as the movie progressed. Siddhartha's disillusionment with the quest for spiritual enlightenment, turning to the pursuit of material wealth, and discovering that the truth remains elusive on either side of the fence and that what ultimately makes life worth living is inner contentment and love.
Everything in it was resonating with me - nature, people, pace, divine ruthlessness, experiences and the learning. I remembered Kakali-auntie, my friend from Vedanta Temple, mentioning to me one day during our conversation that you are talking like Siddhartha from the novel. Since I didn't know the novel then, I didn't think too much about it but made a note to read it one day.
Siddhartha is strong, smart and motivated as you can see from some of his lines are:
"Writing is good, thinking is better. Cleverness is good, Patience is better."
"I can think, I can wait. I can fast."
"He has robbed me, yet he has given me something of greater value . . . he has given to me myself."
(To Kamala) "You are like me. You have a sanctuary within you where you can retreat at any time and be yourself. At peace. "
I cannot get over this sentence so I am going to spend some time on it.
Siddhartha sees that Kamala is at peace. She has already found what he is looking for. She doesn't know it because she was never looking for it. Yet she has it. However, we see in the movie how his cleverness gets in the way every time he tries to reach the sanctuary within himself. She, on the other hand, loves him deeply and can sense the same sanctuary in him too (without thinking). She enjoys being with him immensely because her sanctuary meets her physical reality when they are together. They can just be. However, she can also sense that he is not really there with her. He is far away - trying to get somewhere. She gently makes an attempt by calling him from her sanctuary. He, unable to see, gives a clever reply "People like us cannot love". She is deeply saddened. But soon retreats back, alone, and responds calmly 'Not all people are clever, Siddhartha". -- How can you "show/convince" someone that nothing else is there but love?
In the end, Siddhartha comes to the river and spends rest of his life ferrying people. Trying to be content and happy within himself. Trying to reach that sanctuary where the prostitute Kamala lived in the midst of her life.
Some lines from the book (which I am yet to read):
"Seeking means: to have a goal; but finding means: to be free, to be receptive, to have no goal."
"It may be important to great thinkers to examine the world, to explain and despise it. But I think it is only important to love the world, not to despise it, not for us to hate each other, but to be able to regard the world and ourselves and all beings with love, admiration and respect."
"Within Siddhartha there slowly grew and ripened the knowledge of what wisdom really was and the goal of his long seeking. It was nothing but a preparation of the soul, a capacity, a secret art of thinking, feeling and breathing thoughts of unity at every moment of life."
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Buddha says, "Goal is to end the suffering by the systematic destruction of desire and not dwell upon the cause." But can everyone become a hermit? Can everyone survive Mara's backlash physically by sitting alone under a tree?
Emerson says, "Reliance (on the universe) and self-reliance both are necessary." Some paradox of life!
Vedanta says, "Attain complete freedom by expanding so much that all becomes me."
Holy Mother says, "Learn to make the whole world your own. No one is a stranger, my child. The whole world is your own."
Dalai Lama says, "A more altruistic attitude is very relevant in today's world. If we look at the situation from various angles, such as the complexity and inter-connectedness of the nature of modern existence, then we will gradually notice a change in our outlook, so that when we say 'others' and when we think of others, we will no longer dismiss them as something that is irrelevant to us. We will no longer feel indifferent."
Even the Monkeyspehere:
http://www.cracked.com/article_14990_what-monkeysphere_p1.html
So many ways of conveying the same thing.
All that we are trying to do is to Find Our Way Back Into Love.
*' A song from the movie Music and Lyrics.
