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Friday, March 9, 1990
I am not enlightened.
I may never be.
There is nothing I can do to become enlightened - what will be will be.
If it is meant to happen it will.
I believe I am ready to receive. I make myself open to do the will of
the divine. If He wants me to become a monk and meditate all day long,
I shall. Whatever the case.
So what is it I'm to do?
The answer always is to just be me. This is all I can do, be.
Even sitting in this hotel room in Rishikesh, India, it makes no difference.
So why don't I run and take cover in one of the ashrams here? It is not
being me. It is not what my heart tells me to do. I am repelled by such
places. (Which is not to say another could not benefit greatly by such
a thing.)
Enlightenment may come one way or another - through meditation or not.
I don't know.
I recall once when I was in junior high school. I was very upset about
something. I was lying in bed agonizing in tears. Then I heard a voice.
It said, "Let yourself be you."
Those words feel so good to me. So simple, yet so wise. I'm going through
some changes now. I think I won't be
[Page 14 of the hard copy manuscript]
Friday, March 23, 1990 Kathmandu
"Well anyway, I don't
really care to do anything. Am I apathetic? Maybe, maybe not. Perhaps
doing nothing is real genius. And perhaps time will show the proof of
this.
When meditating yesterday I realized all I wanted to do was find a quiet
place to be. Maybe do some meditation. Prepare my own meals. I'm thinking
of a place in the mountains of India. Maybe near Badarinath, near a village
where I can get food.
I'm thinking of even living in a CAVE. Imagine that! I won't have to look
for a yogi in a Himalayan cave, I will be the yogi in a cave.
What a trip.
This really was nothing more
than a fantasy that I was writing about. I did not think it held any real
possibility at the time.
Saturday, March 24, 1990 [Reflections
on Rishikesh while in Kathmandu]
"You smoke?" he
asked gestering an imaginary cigarette between his thumb and forefinger
being brought to his mouth for a drag.
"No," I said simply, shaking my head.
"You drink. Whiskey?" He asked with a similar gesture with an
imaginary shot glass.
"No," I said again, just the same as before.
"You eat meat?" He asked this time pointing his index finger
at me.
"Nope," I think I might have said.
"You good man" he says emphatically. "Smoking, drinking,
eating meat - bad habits," he pauses for a minute to collect his
English. "Vegetarianism, meditation - good habits."
We already discussed earlier that I practiced meditation.
It made me very happy that Vishnudananda thought of me as a good man,
but after he declared me so, I knew I couldn't be as good as our little
conversation may have shown me to be. With his English being at a minimum,
I found myself hard pressed to explain to him that within the month I
had been in India I had smoked one cigarette - just the day before. It
seems I smoke a cigarette every couple of months just to remind myself
that it is actually not really very pleasant.
We then had a staggered conversation about hippies and long hair. I told
him not all hippies do drugs and some are very good. Contrary to the common
Indian concepts of hippies. At one point I asked about many of the portraits
of the Hindu god figures he had on the wall. While talking about the picture
of Vishnu I said, "He has long hair, like a hippie." Both he
and his wife laughed. I tried to explain to him that the hippies opened
up a lot of new ideas into American/Western culture, such as a significant
new interest in eastern spirituality, including Hinduism.
We talked about languages for a while and he being a Sanskrit teacher
says to me, "You study Sanskrit." I said I would like to.
Upon my departure from his house he told me he was happy I came and I
went on my way with everyone smiling.
Since I'm not feeling well
today, I just stayed home in bed. Although I did just go out and have
a coke, which is the only thing I've consumed all day. So I am bored and
night has fallen here in Kathmandu, so I have nothing to do. Writing will
have to fill my time.
Sitting all day alone in this room is a spiritual exercise like meditation.
My mind keeps going everywhere except the present moment. Today I was
back in India, Delhi, Northampton, Jacksonville, Columbus, Ohio, Phoenix.
Finally I had to say wait a minute, I'm in Kathmandu.
But one thing I've been noticing that it is perfectly human to love. Love
is an inherent part of nature, if not our ultimate essence. It seems the
mind is always looking for an object of love. Particularly when the mind
has no particular work, or problem to occupy it.
But love always has to grow like nature itself. It is live which makes
the flowers blossom and the birds build nests. Love is the power of creation.
The way nature works is to forever expand in love, which is reproduction
on the mundane level.
[page 27 of the hard copy manuscript]
The drive to love erroneously
thinks it can be satisfied through an object. Without desire-object complex
one still loves, but universally. Then one becomes pure love. One is One
is love. Love itself is enough.
To come to the fullness of one's inner true love, to realize God within
is like a great burning bright sun compared to a candle flame flicker
of our object love.
To realize this state we have to be in the world to learn to overcome
our object-love. We are tested again and again this way. We fixate on
an object only to be shown this is impermanent. The object of our love
is disintegrated or goes away and we are left severely heartbroken. But
in time our heart is healed and we grow strong in the absence of our object
of love. Then, only when we least expect it a new object of love appears
in our life. This time even greater and more powerful than the time before,
because this is the lesson of life: to grow forever stronger in love without
fixating on an object of love. And this even greater love will leave us
to be left to grow in strength in the absence of this even greater love
object. All the while these love objects are opening our own hearts up
wider and wider, so that we can radiate more and more love ourselves,
becoming love object test for others.
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