O Grace, where art thou

   

   















     Today I exchanged few words with my godsister. The topic was grace coming to us from above. She very nicely presented her sentiment in a poem, I will let myself to share it here, it’s beautiful:

To come across a friend of the soul

is the reassurance

of ten thousand loving arms

wrapping themselves around you.

     It made me realize that I don’t feel it in my life. I dream about it, have longing for it, imagine how it would be, even try to stimulate this sentiment by telling myself how lucky I am, to find Krishna consciousness, Guru Maharaja, etc. But deep inside I feel like a beggar, petitioning God to give me that experience (to no avail). Sometimes I’m challenging him. “I did enough. Now is your turn – prove your love. Why the burden of proving it should be laying only on my side?” I know – we are baddha jivas, the love is not our right, it’s a gift, we need to attract Krishna, anukulyena krsnanu, etc. But this is philosophical knowledge for me. Deep down inside I feel unfairly bereft of God’s grace, I feel like a lonely, lost, orphaned soul thrown into the cold ocean of the Universe.

     I envision loving, personal God, because without this idea the emptiness of the world would be very difficult to bear, if not impossible. I’m attached to Gaudiya Vaisnavism, because it makes very convincing case for this dream of mine (loving, personal God, eternal spiritual home), but I lack the experience. I’m not talking now about experience of my spiritual nature, I know I’m not the matter. I’m talking about the direct experience of God’s grace filling up my heart. To feel “ten thousand loving arms wrapping themselves around me”, as Tadiya put it nicely.

     I wish it came some day. There is something optimistic in all that (don’t think that I’m just being depressed here:). As I get to a certain age, it becomes more clear to me what are my deepest dreams and desires. And because of that I start to know what’s important, and also I have something to look forward. The grace must come at some point. It’s like waiting for Christmas.

Days of yore

     This is one of my favorite pictures of all times. It’s Cork City (Ireland), 1998. I'm the brahmacari with mridanga. We had just opened a preaching center there, It was my first abroad travel and I was so happy:) I didn't know a single word in English at that time, it was quite challenging, but soon I learned some. We went on harinam twice a day, every day, for three months. Then our visas expired, so Ananta Sesa (guy on my right) and me, we had to go back to Poland. It was before we were in EU, so we couldn't have stayed in Western Europe for too long.

Imagine Love

Imagine Love

Imagine, you love Him

like loving a young girl –

all you think is how she feels

what she needs, where she is

in a sense you don’t exist,

in a sense at least.

Imagine you love Him

like a climber loves a mountain.

Standing at the top

all you feel is freedom,

all you see is space and beauty,

you don’t even know words any more.

In a sense you don’t exist.

Imagine you love Him

like a traveler loves the road,

the road dust smells like a lilac bush,

you don’t mind a stone for a pillow,

as long as you may roam,

as long as nothing stops you,

and in a sense you don’t exist,

you and your way are one.

Imagine you love Him

and He loves you back.

Hand in hand with your lover

on the mountain top,

dark, blue sky,

clear, icy air,

and in a sense you don’t exist,

you’re just for Him,

and everything else

is just a dream.

Self-forgetfulness

     Guru maharaja often talks about self-forgetfulness. I feel like it’s the one of the most important concepts in our tradition. He says: “Gaudiya Vaisnavism considers self-forgetfulness to be a further development of self-sacrifice. In Vrindavana, even Krsna forgets himself (his Godhood) in order to interact with the residents in intimate moods of love.” In other place he says: “Anyone who studies Krsna lila carefully will see that it speaks about absolute giving and self-forgetfulness as no other tradition does. One who truly embraces self-forgetfulness in love experiences Krsna lila, the poetic love life of the Absolute.”

     In order to experience love, we must forget ourselves, lose ourselves, give up our separate interest, “die to live”. Only then we may be allowed to enter “the land of love and dedication” as Srila BR Sridhar dev Goswami likes to call the spiritual realms.

     I was thinking about it couple of days ago. I woke up early morning. The sun (which I had not seen for a while, alas winter doesn’t want to go away) shone straight on my face. I don’t know, maybe it was the sun, maybe something else, a dream perhaps, but I thought very clearly: “How would it be to love Krishna? Not to think about ambitions, desires, problems, this and that, but forget all, and feel that the only sense of existence lays in loving and serving God?” I loved the idea. It was such a relief even just to think about it. That morning I had the best rounds ever.

     When for the last couple of years I was going trough a rough period in life, I read many psychological, transpersonal, spiritual (to some degree) books.  I found a good stuff there, lots of gems, ideas of self-realization, sacrifice, freedom from ego. But I have to admit, all those books and ideas were missing something. All of them to some degree focused on the “self”, they thought some form of self-centeredness. There is a value in it, value of being conscious, aware, focused. But I don’t think I stumbled on the idea of self-forgetfulness in there. I even think its authors would consider it some kind of blasphemy if you said “forget yourself, forget your problems, don’t live for yourself, live for something (someone) higher”. And yet I’m convinced that the real freedom, real happiness, real satisfaction of the heart hides in that secret, sacred twist of consciousness – change from the self-centeredness to self-forgetfulness. 

     Sometimes my friends ask for advice. They talk about their problems, mind issues, anxiety, worries, relationship stuff, etc. I’m sympathetic, I’m going trough this crap myself, and very often I’m completely covered, I can’t even see the light at the end of the tunnel. But in the moments of clarity I understand how pointless may be trying to solve all those issues separately. Mostly they are born of self-absorption. But it’s not easy to accept it when you are exactly in the middle of a ditch, so often I don’t know what to advice.

     What helps me to get over it? Difficult to say; most of the time I am self centered myself. But observing my small steps I see the value of sincere, heart-felt prayer, regularity and steadiness in spiritual practices (my new re-discovery), connecting with selfless sadhus trough the sastra and talks, and the basics – chanting of maha-mantra. So again – nothing new, we all know this stuff. 

Srila B. R. Sridhar Maharaja – A Dream

Srila B. R. Sridhar Maharaja – A Dream

     I had this dream about five years ago, I just stumbled upon it in my diary this morning, and I though it was worth putting here. As the dreams go I don’t have too mystical approach, I don’t read too much into them, but when spiritual personalities or situations happen, I’m always happy. I just appreciate that my mind has some spiritual occupation in a dream, instead of being completely in maya. So the dream:
     For some reason, I can’t recall how, I was able to get darsan with Srila Sridhara Maharaja. Overwhelmed with awe, reverence but also joy, I entered his room. He was sitting in the wicker chair. He looked different from the pictures I saw – he was younger, maybe forty five years old, maybe fifty, but somehow I knew for sure, it was him.
     There was one more devotee inside. He was asking some advice. Śridhara Maharaja listened patiently, and when the devotee finished, Maharaja turned to me.
     “You answer” he said.
     I almost fainted, I was so excited, happy and scared. I wanted to do it right, so I asked to hear the question again. The devotee was wandering about the choice of a guru. He knew two Vaisnavas and he wasn’t sure which one was right for him.
     I knew, I couldn’t really quote sastras very well, so I decided to speak what I feel. I said that choosing spiritual master must be based on the heart. The scriptural knowledge has to be there, but the most important thing is the feeling. A feeling brought us to Krishna consciousness in the first place, so we should trust it on the remaining part of our spiritual path. Krishna is in our heart. When we are sincere, we hear him, as the voice of the heart.
     I was going on for a while, watching Maharaja out of the corner of my eye. I was relieved to see that he was nodding with approval. When I finished, he quoted a beautiful verse confirming what I just said (I wish I remembered it:).
     Then the devotee left and suddenly I was alone with Maharaja. He was very mellow, peaceful, so soon I relaxed too. He asked about my life, what I do, if I’m happy. It was casual and at the same time very spiritual. When I told him that I’m connecting myself with Tripurari Swami, he was very happy. He said that Swami will take good care of me.
     I woke up.

When I was a wolf

     The life is magic, and I don’t mean it just in some metaphorical sense. The universe is really magic. We just see and touch the external, pale layer of it. We can reach deeper, if we really try. I’m pretty sure we have the tools, but we are so stupefied, so covered nowadays.

     I can say from my own example. I lived my teenage years in the pre-internet era. We just had one TV channel. The only computer in the village belonged to a cop’s kid, and we used it to play (rarely) Commodore 64 games. When you wanted a music album, either you had to buy it (ha, ha, who had the money? It was like 1/10 of an avarage wage) or make a cassette copy, usually in a very bad quality. When you needed information, you had to use a big, heavy, often outdated encyclopaedia. When you wanted to meet someone, you just went to his home and knocked on the door.

     Of course the life wasn’t idyllic, I had plenty of problems, involving broken heart, drugs and alcohol abuse, family issues, school problems – typical teenager quandaries. But somehow the mind worked in a slower pace, and not only that; it was also more magic-sensitive. I remember the evenings, long winter walks, watching bright stars and the moon, and experiencing such a thrilling sensation of the presence of mystical beings, continuity of existence, higher connection… (I’m not including here the drugs’ experiences, so bugger off, I wasn’t high;). There were so many things, so many shades of emotions and feelings. Not only that. There were things happening, amazing things (but I leave it for another time).

     Many things changed since 90’s. Everything has speeded up. The unlimited access to information filled our heads, but emptied souls. We know more, but we experience less. That’s so scary. And many of us can’t cope with this unhealthy state. We suffer anxiety, depression, panic, feeling of being lost, meaningless of the world. And it’s not because the world lost its meaning (or never had it). It’s because we are so deafen by this lurid hubbub around us, that we can’t make any sense of anything. We are like a deer stepping out of the wild forest on a highway, blinded by the lights of a big truck which is about to smash him to a pulp. This is unhealthy world we live in, not us, who is messed up.

     We have to try to shake it off, break free, find our spiritual connection to the higher world...

To walk in the winter nights,

With snow creaking under boots,

With ancient gods and spirits

Waving to us from their sky-ships,

With our thoughts crisp and clear,

Our roots deep and sturdy,

Our wings lighter then moonlight.

I remember the dark winter nights,

When I was a wolf.

I’ll meet you there.

To believe or not to believe?

     In spite of appearances I'm not encouraging here to couldn't-give-a-damn attitude. I believe (oh, that faith again!) in the experiential spiritual life. And I distaste fanaticism and bigotry, no matter if it is the religious or atheistic one. I've encountered both and they are equally annoying;)