Time to sleep!

Enough is enough, time to withdraw into the inner dimension of who I am and let the outside realm takes care of itself; all hell can break loose, I have to take a step back into my foxhole and contemplate. I had to let my mind express what my feelings were over the past few weeks with regard to the issues developing around the world simply because it is my way or letting it be known the i was present when things were not so pleasant in this dimension as of this moment. However i find myself getting sucked into feeling negative over the whole matter and it is causing me energy drainage unnecessarily. Simply put, there is not much the i can do if people are being butchered all around the world and if there is i would only be adding on to the suffering already going on. So suffice to say that my expressing my feelings over the matter through my writing this Blog of the matter is my way of doing something about it. 
When Gautama the Buddha was about to depart from the palace, his home to seek for answers to the question life and suffering, he looked upon his wife and child sleeping in his bed chamber. He had named his son Rahula which means, tether or something like a tie up pole or hitching pole. Saying good bye to his wife and child was the hardest thing for him they were his tethers. In my life I tried to not be too attached to my wife and children or for my closest friends for that matter. I often find myself moving away or stepping back from getting too close to them and i call it my retreat and ironically my son Karim once called it an escape. Perhaps it is and i am not as responsible as i should be towards my loved ones. I have my own rationale however, i am a solitary bird that is on a mission to find out and that perhaps is my curse and also my blessings. I had decided that i would not abandon my children for so long as there is one that needs my presence if for nothing else just and emotional support and comfort. I am glad to see that my daughter is finally getting to become a lady of substance and capable of standing on her own. I hope that the day will come soon when I too can say my farewell to my children and continue my solitary journey of self discovery and inner awakening/
Over the years i have prepared the groundwork for my future as well as my children and perhaps it was out of ignorance that i had tried to project what I would like to happen ideally back in my younger days, however today much of what i had envisioned had taken shape and not only as i had desired but in many ways surpasses my expectations. Oh, life has not been all smooth sailing no doubt, but what had turned out is more exciting than can be expected for one who ask for little of this life and expects even less. One of the image i see of myself from my younger days is that I am as Alan Watts, the Zen philosopher once coined as an 'elegant beggar'. I find my accepted role to have manifested itself today, living hand to mouth and owning practically not a thing worth calling a property. I live off others kindness and sympathy and i am broke most of time: I am happy, I feel light and other than my own self inflicted worries and pain, I am quite contented.
I am getting ready for an exhibition of my works scheduled in March of next year. I have some ideas of what i would do but am still not positive the exact nature of my show as yet and so i am working on it. It is not that i am sitting on my fingers with not much to do but i am doing what i want to and not at the dictates of anyone else's. There is no time clock to punch and if i am not happy with what is going on about my life i simply take a long nap,  
   

I am veiled from the truth like the rest.

While living on the east Coast of the Malay Peninsular in the state of  Terengganu I became very close friend with a doctor from Iraq, a Doctor Ali. He had been living and practicing as a medical surgeon at one of the local hospitals in Kuala Terengganu. he and his family had been living there for nine years before I met him. When talking about why he had left Iraq, he told me an interesting story of his escape from the country that was then at war with Iran.The doctor was a medic during the was and was stationed on the front lines. All through his career as a doctor in the Iraqi military he told me he had patched up numerous casualties and seen many dead or maimed for life. Most were young men and he felt sorry to see how their lives were wasted on the battle field.
What finally mad him chose to leave his homeland was after he had a realization of how futile it all was. One morning when he woke up to perform the dawn prayer like all the rest of his comrades it dawned upon him the fact that all was quiet across the whole landscape except for the call to prayer from the loudspeaker on both sides of the divide. Then for a few minutes there was absolute silence as the men were praying. As soon as the time for the 'Subh' prayer was over the firing began from both sides the Iraqis and the Iranians were at each other's throats as though nothing mattered. It was this incident that prompted the doctor to make his choice saying that enough was enough; the war was insane and he would have no part in it.
I consider myself blessed not having the experience of living in times of war as i know from what I witness through media and other sources of a countries at war, life can be hell on earth. For whatever cause or reason that men goes to war it is a curse upon humanity as life becomes trivial and violence becomes the rule of law.I am postive that the Lord of Creation has a special place in hell for all those who act or cause for the instigation that leads to man killing his fellow man. "Thou shalt not kill!" was the first of the Ten Commandments that the Prophet Moses received etched on stone from his Lord and just about every religion of man professes the same mandate in one form or another. Sadly enough, today man goes to the killing fields even in the name of their religions, like history has no effect on us. From the times of the Crusades onwards, religious conflict has caused untold miseries and claimed too many innocent lives for no valid reason other than mine is the true religion, better than yours.
From the Gaza Strip to Kashmir, from Miyanmar to Sudan,  we claim the right to kill all in the name of religion and sectarian belief that is nothing more than an excuse for other hidden agenda like territorial and economic controls. Why are we so bound and determined to annihilate ourselves over  mere concepts and misunderstanding of our true intentions? Why are we being led like sheep to the slaughter house by those in power and has only their self serving interest in mind? My answer will always be that we fail to realize who we truly are as individuals and how collectively we are the power that can make the difference. Our collective consciousness has never been allowed to flower to its utmost potential and this done systematically or unconsciously through the divisiveness that our conditioning has been put through especially by Religion and Nationalism. We are being brought up into believing that as individuals we are inconsequential. What can one man do? Such is life. live and learn to accept it. These are the discouraging words that we have become familiar with throughout our life unless somewhere down the line we were awakened to reality; that we are living in an illusion that others have designed for us all along.
What can a lone eagle do midst the hordes of crows that threatens its very existence except to fly even higher into the clouds and eventually cease to exist. I have tried as best i could to live off the grid and not succumb to the mundane existence of eking a living day to day like what my society demands of me; to be normal. I make it my way not to demand for more than I really need and allowing me to pursue what I have set out to achieve for my own self discovery and understanding of who i am and what my potentials are as human being, what is my role in the divine mandate and universal truth in this life. My quest is nothing compared to some who have attained to the truth and lived life according to their own choices free from the grips of a decadent society.I am still locked in the prison of my own mind digging my way out but my mind has been hardened by years of self deluded memories and it may take another lifetime before i can liberate myself if there is one. In the meantime suffice to say that I too am blind folded impervious to what is the truth about my existence. 

Perhaps not a single bullet is manufactured in Syria.

At the potential cost of more innocent lives and bloodshed in the sands of the Middle east, the chess pieces are being set up for a larger conflict involving major key players ironically all with the intention of ending the Syrian conflict. Turkey, backed by the United States, has entered the foray along with the Saudis and the Emirates countries on one side and Syria is backed by Russia, China and Iran on the other. The cause is not so much as nationalism, religious or territorial but still the control of oil flowing out of these countries. Humanity is at the mercy of war mongers who has given up on the idea of sitting at the negotiating tables and find a solution to the issues, people whose agenda is not to save mankind from yet another World war but to instigate another one and possibly the last this planet can afford itself. What of the United Nations? What of God?
This is the ultimate manifestation of Greed, Hate and Ignorance in the history of mankind where our collective karma has come to fruition and the hammer is about to fall upon us if things gets any worse. The prayers of hundreds of thousands of souls who have lost their husbands wives and children to this senseless conflict might have even reached the heavens calling for the damnation of all those responsible for their miseries and the doomsayers are hailing the fulfillment of prophesies according to their Biblical calculations. Like cancerous lacerations the planet is witnessing death and dist ructions scattered all over the face of the globe where wanton killings and genocidal campaigns are the brew for the day. Man  has not learned from history but bound and determined to repeat what mistakes hes had made that caused for the first and second world war, only now it would be hard pressed to see who would be the winner; there will be none.
It is ironic that with the advent of the Internet and such advance technologies we have equipped ourselves with to promote faster and more elaborate form of communication among us, we have come to this impasse. The very miracle that we have been endowed with through our own ingenuity to help us understand each other better has now become the major source of our own self destruction. We have ourselves another 'Tower of Babel' syndrome, only the structure we have created to understand our true nature and how we fit into the scheme of Life itself on this Planet is not simply going to collapse on one spot like the 'Twin Towers' in New York, but it will end our lives as we know it and to survive the next World War would be the miracle or miracles.
Takhbir! Allah-hu-Akhbar! God is Great hails from frightened voices of men from both sides of the lines as sporadic battles rages across the Syrian landscapes. in no time is man closer to God than in the times of war. As a tank negotiates through the rubble of the narrow streets of shattered building the sound of gunfire and dust floating in the air makes it looks like one is watching a Hollywood war movie on You Tube, only this is for real. How much ammunition is spent every single day and who manufactured these weapons that is claiming the lives of the young and old alike? What are they fighting for and who are they shooting at or who is shooting back at them? Who really cares anymore after watching videos after videos of death and destruction one becomes comfortably numb to the atrocities and the wanton shootouts; thanks to Hollywood for setting the stage for this reality show. A Syrian network even played the theme song from the Western Movie, 'The Good. the bad and the Ugly' while video taping a scene of their fellow countrymen being killed in a blast. What have we become in this age of Information Technology, instead of propagating Love and friendship and a spirit of better understanding through sharing of information, we provide the world a horror show of the killing fields where men kill one another like it is a sport: and it is said that only man kills for sport.

" The regime of Bashar Al Assad are the ones responsible for what the UN called a complete melt down of Humanity. Are you truly incapable of shame? Is there literally nothing that can shame you?"
Samantha Power - US Ambassador to the United nations.
Vox News.

A case of a pot calling a kettle black; the shame is on Humanity itself when a child is brutally shot in the street in front of her home who is to blame?

"We've got the Saudis and Iran, everybody moving in and puppeteering and playing proxy wars and it is a tragedy to watch em."
Boris Johnson - British Foreign Secretary.
BBC News.









   

What goes around...

As an individual we are, it is believed in some faith and religions that we keep creating our own karmic consequences and in this none is more true as in Buddhism. What we churn out through our actions in this realm of existence will decide for what we will inherit in our next, such is the basic tenet of Incarnation. This is not only true for the individual however, as we are collectively interrelated in our being and our psycho/ physical nature with the res of the planet, whatever we do collectively in this life also becomes our karmic responsibility. Through our human history mankind has fought against each other over anything and everything that could not be negotiated or talked it out. A man kills another over a water buffalo crossing into his neighbors field, another kills his neighbor because the other could not turn away from gazing zt his wife or daughter; we kill over the most ridiculous excuses and out of rage.
Collective we kill over the need to be recognize as a superior race or nation, we kill over the need to dominate and lord over our fellow humans, we need to possess what belongs to others and so forth. However today we kill simply over and idea, an 'ism', we kill over symbol or in the name of our religion. We as humans have become the most aggressive creature ever created on earth; we kill for sports. When viewed upon in the light of 'Karmic consequences', collectively we are guilty in a very big way and there is really no valid excuse for us anymore but to reap our transgressions through our generations yet to come. It is not hard to see that what we are reaping today is the transgressions of our fore fathers who were in their  own time killers and murderers when they decided to launch campaigns upon campaigns of conquest and colonization of weaker nations. 
Today we are witnessing how countries that have have negative karmic history are reaping their past actions as is happening in the United States, Britain and Germany and many other so called Developed nations. These nations are going through a Karmic cleansing from with and without. Other smaller nations are experiencing their own inner turmoil from past transgression of the powers that be in the form of civil wars and religious conflicts. There is no escape from the wheel of Karma for us as individuals or collectively and if we look at our own history we will discover the root of our grief and suffering. Deep rooted karma are lay dormant in every one of us as in our collective consciousness and for so long as we ignore and bury them to be forgotten, they will in time arise and cause untold miseries in our lives. 

“Even chance meetings are the result of karma… Things in life are fated by our previous lives. That even in the smallest events there’s no such thing as coincidence.” 
― Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore 

“The institutions of human society treat us as parts of a machine. They assign us ranks and place considerable pressure upon us to fulfill defined roles. We need something to help us restore our lost and distorted humanity. Each of us has feelings that have been suppressed and have built up inside. There is a voiceless cry resting in the depths of our souls, waiting for expression. Art gives the soul's feelings voice and form.” 
― Daisaku Ikeda

We are all involved.- Plight of the Rohingya in Myanmar.

The conflict in Myanmar between the predominantly Buddhist population and the ethnic Rohingya has claimed lives in the thousands and most being brutally murdered in what has become an ethnic cleansing that  has surpassed most in the history of man in its brutality and wanton disregard for human lives. yet the United Nations has not even uttered a word of protest much less take any real physical action in containing the situation. it is very sad indeed for mankind when we have become capable of acts of merciless killing much worse than any in the animal kingdom, and we are living in the twenty first century, the beginning of a new millennial. It so seems that mankind are becoming more and more insensitive to life and what it means to be alive. We are bound and determined to create hell on earth as though we have no other options.
The followers of the Buddha has proven the teachings of Buddhism is not impervious to violence and is more than capable of carrying out atrocities towards their fellow man, women and children. For whatever legitimate, political, economic or religious excuses, the bloodbath being carried out will go down in History as yet another dark spot in the history of humanity. Another evidence that man has now become worse than animals despite what the religious and spiritual doctrine they abide by dictates. Even as the conflict in Syria is still raging claiming lives day in day out and the burning amber of  the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is still smoldering, we now are witnessing yet another, catastrophe in the making. man it seems will never learn from the experiences and the mistakes we make in history and is bound and determine towards self destruction.
It is perhaps because we have lost our sense of being a part and parcel of the 'whole' that we have become capable of such acts of insane terror towards each other. Perhaps our ignorance of who we truly are has gotten the better of us and our sense of compassion and intelligence has been totally erased from our consciousness. Collectively, those of us who through our spirituality profess to uphold peace and harmony in this world are just as deaf and blind to the cries of humanity and we pride ourselves in being able to influence many towards healing the planet through our belief and faith and practice. In these dark days of the decline of the human race, only the One true Creator has the power to change what is the negative into positive and sadly enough He (or She) is occupied somewhere else in these galaxies of ours. On second thought maybe it is best for Him not to take too much notice of what we are doing to each other and not to mention this plane itself in the process. It is highly doubtful that He will have much to be proud or happy about what we have to offer. 
In the Quranic, Biblical sense we have become servants to the fallen angels; God has lost where mankind is concern or has He yet? And the Buddha would be totally devastated to see what has become of His teachings. The clash of religions all over the world is becoming the latest human tragedy and we are all a part and parcel to this tragedy with no exception for we are humanity itself, each and every single one of us, as we are all interconnected as a collective whole.      

Listening to the rhythm of the falling rain.

Nothing can wake you up to reality in this day and age than a visit to the cemetery where they were burying one of your acquaintances about your age. For me being among gravestones and listening to the sermon or final words from the preacher as a send off advice on how to handle the after death issues, sobers me up. Listening to the final rites being served to the departed raises my consciousness toward the impermanence of life and how i too one day sooner or later will be laid down the same rites witnessed by a group of people who hopefully will be there to send me off. The sermon however was more for the benefit of the living than the dead for it reminds one of the duties one have while alive towards becoming a responsible human being and so forth. Filial piety, the love and respect one holds towards one's parents even after their departure from this life is paramount in the Islam. This act of servitude towards our parents only ends when we ourselves are dead. 
Sometime early this morning between two to three am. I sat listening to Shri Mooji on You Tube and it was the most powerful Satsang lecture that i had listened to from him. i think it is called "You are the ultimate Consciousness". Funny how i cannot find the same video again tried as i did. Every word he uttered hit a chord within me like he was mere repeating what i had been telling myself word for word but never truly accepting them to be the truth.Perhaps it was the time, the right place and the right moment and so forth, listening to the rain, falling tapping on the zinc roof and the occasional traffic that  drifts by splashing water from the road, and then the fact that i had just sat in meditation and had a very deep experience of feeling my whole entire body came alive, muscle for muscle, bones for bones, this i never felt as strongly before. my body went into an almost violent spasm that almost lifted itself off the floor before settling back down into the most calm and light feeling free of aches and pain. 
I believe the voice of the Guru, the Teacher, the Master happens from out of nowhere nailing my coffin shut with every line he spoke, like putting a seal of recognition and approval upon what I have been practicing all these years. My own self doubt has been the veils that has been hiding the truth from me and my resistance from accepting what is the truth the has always been there before me. I might even say that i had a mini satori from listening to this talk by Mooji and i have been following his Satsang talks ever since he came to my attention; I felt light from within me. After the episode I sat on my bed as i could not sleep and suddenly i felt such loneliness as i have never felt before and began to sob in tears, I could not tell if i was crying out of sorrow or joy anymore. It was liberating kind of feeling that I have in the past experienced every now and then especially after i decided that i had enough of this whole soul searching trip of mine. It was a feeling like an addict who has been given a higher dose of what he has been taking to satisfy himself. It even crossed my mind that i was high and not from any external or material aid like drugs.
Hence being in the cemetery and witnessing my friend being laid to rest added on to the experience in a way telling me that nothing is permanent and all must come to an end...and this too will pass. My gratitude goes out to Shri Mooji who through his Satsang talks on You Tube has has been my wake up call giving hope and courage to further dive within and purify myself that I may discover a more permanent grasp of the truth and reality of this life, to understand who I truly am and why I am here in the first place.

Road to Enlightenment.

When all is said and done, there is very little left to say and do except keep trudging along this life's open highway and merge with all eternity in the process. Questions and answers will keep popping up and the mind will keep being agitated by the minutest of stimuli external or internal in origin, conscious or unconsciously we keep trying to brace ourselves for the next big wave that would lift us up or smash us against the bottom of the ocean. Like a yo yo we bounce up and down weave in and out from all the trappings that is laid before us, but we try our very best to maintain our sanity till we arrive at the end of the road. What we have accumulated and what we have learned will all meant for nothing if we have not yet discovered who we truly are and how or why we are here in the first place.
Whatever cards we are dealt with and which way the dice rolls, we try to remember that we are the masters of our own destiny and none is there to blame if we think otherwise. There is none above or below who we are as all answers to the One and only One, he who Created the scenario of our existence, Who wrote ticket to the show and Who at the end of the will demand to know what we have done with ourselves all along the allotted time we were given, what have we to show? Blessed are those who are atheist as they will not have to deal with all these or so is their believe. For those of us who believe in the hereafter, in heaven and hell and in the final judgement, well we better be a little more prepared to justify ourselves as it is written in the Good Book that we have to. Hence it is not so wrong to say that having faith, belief and religion is a great cause for anxiety and fear. So man spends a good amount of his time living in fear of the unknown future; the afterlife. No man has ever returned to confirm what lies beyond death except what is written in the Holy Books and the experiences of the Prophet of old. 
We are born out of this world as the philosopher, thinker, Alan Watts once said and as such we are a product of our environment and circumstances. As we mature and become more involved in our interactions with life around us we become what we are each in his or her way of perceiving and adapting to life. Our mind becomes the programmer adding and editing what is what is not relevant to us in order to live as best we could. However most of us have become a slave to our mind through ignorance, we stop questioning the validity of the thinking mind and as a result we become self centered and self serving as the mind is ever demanding to become more than what it is. We develop an ego, a part of our mind that craves for more and better, this manifest as greed and with greed we become more aggressive in our behavior protecting and defending what we already have which turns into hate. having developed these two negative traits in ourselves we become delusional, we think we are entitled to become Gods which ends in ignorance. Suffering these three illnesses called greed, Hate and Ignorance we have lost our humanity, we forget who we are. What is needed is a wake up call, we need to become enlightened. We are on the road to enlightenment whether we are aware of it or not and for those who are fortunate enough to have woken up from the sleep of ignorance, their destiny is in their hands.

Incarnation has an expiry date.

I am merely knocking on heaven's door and am far from His seat that many a brave heart and men of will have quested and attained to serve at His feet. I am merely beginning to see the light of His Grace and Compassion catching glimpses of the Truth that has laid hidden from my deluded existence for many years of my life. I sought to understand my errors and mend as much as I can my transgressions in the past, but i have yet to be able to claim myself to be  true Muslim. I am not a missionary of the religion in this my writing, i am not trying to convince anyone of the truth or false of any belief and practice any faith or religious denomination. I am merely seeking for answers for myself, this ignorant mind that has for so long been running loose without care or consideration for others in my life. Saying i am sorry for all the wrongs i have committed is not enough, i need to repent to the fullest extent of my conscience and become liberated from my past by acceptance of my divine nature. I am as such, am looking for that which is my original self before my parents had conceived me to be and before i was allowed to transmigrate into this present existence.
It is my believe if not understanding and realization that all karma has a time expiry date in this last Kalpa of our human existence. With the teachings of the last Prophet being laid out and his religion being set in stone, Islam is the capping stone of all of humanity's spiritual evolution. It is not by chance that Islam came as the last of the major religions and the prophet of Allah claiming that he will be the last of His kind. Human spiritual evolution has taken as long as man was being transformed from an ape into an enlightened being on this Planet; it has been a long and tedious walk towards self realization for most of humanity. For those who were fortunate enough to have awoken from their sleep of ignorance through right belief and understanding, it is not far fetched to see that humanity is winding down towards the 'End of Days'. The universe itself is slowing down its expansion according to scientists and soon will stop and begin its retraction towards its center where it all began and cause the final implosion where only the light of creation itself remains before being absorbed back into the One, the Owner and Creator, Lord of the Universe. Game over, the final curtain falls.
But these are all just my head spinning out theories that i have come to put together in the effort to make sense out of non-sense. It is out of my own personal self- spiritual evolution that i make these conclusions based upon the knowledge I have gathered throughout my life, as a Buddhist and a Muslim (later), my understanding of Hinduism and Taoism, from reading the enlightened minds of philosophers and poets and from scientists and theorists that i have come across.; I feel that our existence on this planet will albeit as Caliphs or caretakers is slowly but surely coming to an end. 
The belief in Incarnation of the soul has become null as evolution itself is winding down towards a no end in sight. It is becoming evident by what is happening to us and the effect we have on the planet, that we have wasted our time and energy through our ignorance of what or who we are in relation to the Whole. We are suffering from spiritual decay and taking our self created mental formations as reality to the point of assuming we are capable of becoming Gods ourselves. We have become trapped in our egoistic tendencies as to not be able to see anymore that we are One and that we return to the One at the end of the day. We as humans have allowed ourselves to be ruled by, Greed, hate and Ignorance in our daily lives despite all the warnings from our ancestors. In short we, the guardians of this beautiful planet of ours have become parasitic and are consuming the very abode we live in like termites. The horrendous torments we inflict upon our very own species is testimony towards how very cancerous we have all become. The hope that we will be reincarnated into the next life as this or that has become redundant and irrelevant.

"He is the raiser of levels, the Lord of the Throne of Power. By His order does he send the (inspired) soul to any of His servants He pleases, that hes may warn (men) of the day of meeting (their Lord)" (Sura Mu'minun, 15).





   

    











     

Journey of Purification.

Waking up in the morning especially from a negative effect of an undesirable dream, like in my case, from an unresolved conflict with my twin brother, it is very crucial that one sits and meditate or contemplate over the matter and at least bring it to a more positive end. Unresolved issues of the past is one of our main contributor towards having a good day or yet another depressing one. Sitting meditation before getting of the bed and followed by simple yoga stretching to loosen up the tight muscles and allow for a more smooth flow of the blood and distribution of energy all over the body, helps to dispel the negative effect of the negative dreams. Often we are is such s hurry to get off the bed and crawl towards the bathroom to get our day set in motion with the fear of being late for work or other activities; we neglect to prime the body and mind. Our 'bio- history' as the Swami Paramahamsa Nityinanda would call it carries with it all our unresolved issues of the past the needs to be brought into completion, into a closure or conciliation to end its effect on our present and future conditions.
Every so often our anxieties and depressions are brought upon by unsolved issues of the past conscious or unconsciously and the more we are in touch and dealing with resolving these issues the lighter we become as a result of shedding off all these vexing issues that were from our past lives. Sweeping these issues under the rug will only allow them to ferment and become even more toxic when they make their appearance when triggered by reminders. In Buddhism and Hinduism , these are karmic causing issues and during the Rohatsu Sesshin in Zen Buddhist practice a special prayer is offered and one of the verses that is recited goes as; "All my ancient twisted Karmas, from beginning-less, Greed, Hate and Delusions, Born through Body, Speech and Mind, I now fully avow..." This vow is an effort to eliminate all the past accumulated karmic causing influences that we have generated from out day to day activity. For those who believe in Incarnation this prayer stretches all the way back to our past lives existence; if nothing else this confession helps to remind us of our past errors and the desire to mend our ways.

Every year when December approaches, monks everywhere tremble in anticipation of the arrival of the rohatsu sesshin [intensive meditation retreat]. In Zen dojos everywhere, people intensify their training energy in preparation for this sesshin held from the first to the eighth of December. The rohatsu sesshin is the consummation of a year's training, a time when everyone faces the final reckoning of a year of practice."

The prayer of repentance is prescribed in sharee’ah 

The scholars are unanimously agreed that the prayer of repentance is prescribed in sharee’ah. Abu Dawood (1521) narrated that Abu Bakr al-Siddeeq (may Allaah be pleased with him) said: I heard the Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) say: “There is no one who commits a sin then purifies himself well and stands and prays two rak’ahs, then asks Allaah for forgiveness, but Allaah will forgive him. Then he recited this verse: ‘And those who, when they have committed Faahishah (illegal sexual intercourse) or wronged themselves with evil, remember Allaah and ask forgiveness for their sins; — and none can forgive sins but Allaah — and do not persist in what (wrong) they have done, while they know’ [Aal ‘Imraan 3:135].” Classed as sahaah by al-Albaani in Saheeh Abi Dawood. 

3 – The time for the prayer of repentance 

It is mustahabb to offer this prayer when the Muslim has decided to repent from the sin that he has committed, whether this repentance comes immediately after committing the sin or later on. The sinner must hasten to repent but if he delays it, it will still be accepted, because repentance is accepted so long as one of the following impediments does not occur: 

(i)                When the soul reaches the throat (at death). The Messenger of Allaah (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) said: “Allaah will accept the repentance of His slave so long as the death rattle has not yet begun.” Classed as hasan by al-Albaani in Saheeh al-Tirmidhi (3537).

(ii)              When the sun rises from the west. The Prophet (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) said: “Whoever repents before the sun rises from the west, Allaah will accept his repentance.” Narrated by Muslim (2703). ...Islam Question and Answer.

I am sinner, this I have no doubt about for in my past i have done many things that would be construed as being a major sin and for this iI have much to do for so as to unburden my mind and soul from this baggage. The healing process for me began when I entered the Zen Buddhist monastery to heal my body from an illness that had almost claimed my life. It has been a long and tedious process since then and i am still carrying the baggage although it has somewhat become less heavy. It began with my recognition of what my problems were from the beginning through meditation practices and through a whole lot of reading and practices i have managed to sort and sieve through my ailments, healing my 'splintered soul'. Even as i am writing I am making and effort to confront my sins, my errors, my mistakes of the past.

It is my prayer that i can be purified of all my sins before the 'sun rises in the west.' by my Lord's grace.

Looking for a disciple?

It does not take much for the mind to be derailed from what it is focused upon especially if the object of its attention is of positive in nature, like doing good or the intention to do so, or getting rid of bad habits and so forth. The mind is like an unruly eel that will never be caught so easily and it takes all kinds of traps to catch it and yet after it is caught it is still as slippery as an eel would be. Throughout human history, the study of the human mind has been the highest priority for not to understand the workings of the mind, (mental formations), mankind would have not come this far attaining higher states of consciousness and achieving greater heights of self discoveries and making leaps and bounds in the quest for material glory. To neglect this course of study would at its most extreme case would be insanity, mankind would not have survived had it not evolved the way it had with the mind being fully kept in conscious scrutiny. From the times of the ancient Masters to the present Gurus and savants, saints and philosophers, scientists and psychologists, human evolution has been kept from being derailed by chaos and insanity. 

While at the SRI LOVELY Organic Farm, my retreat space, i me a young man doing his practical research on insects and how to repel them from attacking the rice crop. He was a Chinese and very bright and intelligent young man, with an eagerness seldom found in young adults these days. We became friends and I was so impressed by his genuine desire to learn the i took him under my wings. My first genuine student i dare say because i felt the connection between us was earned and born out of mutual respect. We talked abotu all there was to talk about and i did not held back my imparting of my two cents worth of wisdom to him. I showed him the martial arts techniques of how to use the staff and as well as how to prepare a good chicken curry. What was special with the whole episode was that I felt like a teacher, i felt like I found someone who can comprehend what i was telling him and I am positive that he will carry it with him into his future.
When I first started talking about religions and Islam in particular his immediate reaction was, " OH but, I am a free thinker!" Instead of saying nothing is free, not even your thoughts in this life, i went on talking about things that matters for one to be a respectable individual in a society and so forth. By the end of my two weeks stay at the farm he was more attentive and I told him not to be in such a hurry to claim himself a free thinker,(a cop-out), I told him first he has to understand where thoughts come from and where they disappear to. The day i was leaving I told him I needed to ask him for RM10 as i was short of cash for the Toll to get home. He went into his hut and came out with RM100 and handed it to me saying, "I don't want anything to happen to you along the way with no cash on you, so please accept this."

"The great lady Rabi'a al-Adwiyya, may Allah be pleased with her, used to pray begging Allah, O Lord, give all my share of the world to the non-believers, and if i have any share of the hereafter, distribute it among your faithful servants. All i wish for in this world is to yearn for You, and all i wish for in the hereafter is to be be with you, for both man and what comes to his hands for a short while belong on,ly to the owner of both."... 'The Secret of Secrets'. 

  
" By no means shall you attain righteousness unless you give (freely) of that which you love; and whatever you give in truth Allah knows it well"...(Sura Al'Imran,92) 

I left my favorite bamboo staff and my fishing rod with him seeing these items will keep him occupied in my absence. I might get the chance to see him again then again i might not, all depending upon my financial state, and if my daughter needs my presence in dealing with her business issues.    

The 'Unity of One'

In the Heart Sutra of the Buddha, the Maha prjna paramita Hridaya Sutra, the Buddha expounded the whole state of our human existence as being empty. Form is emptiness and emptiness is form and that which is form, is emptiness and that which is emptiness, is form and the same is true of feelings, impulses, consciousness and so forth...all the five skandas, (senses) are empty of their own being...no eyes no nose no ears and so on. Science today has proven the same truth in the fact that all matter is made up of atoms and molecules held together according to their rate of vibrations and the influences of gravity around it. 
"This is a state of bringing oneself to nothingness, of disappearing in the Essence of Allah. It is to empty one's being of everything which is for one's being and to empty one's heart of everything but His Love. Then theat heart becomes worthy to receive the promise of Allah, "I do not fit intoMy heavens nor my earths, but i fit into the heart of my faithful servant.'" from The Secret of Screts by Sheikh Qadir Al-Jilani.
In Islam to bring one's self in a state of emptiness is called 'Fana' the annihilation of one's state of being-ness, the removal of the ego from one's being at a lower level and to attain to self annihilation at the highest level and thus become one with the ONE. Tor return to the source what belongs to the source all has cease to exist as forms or emptiness, matter or antimatter. As the collision of matter and antimatter results in a tremendous expulsion or force or energy, so does the final attainment to Fana' releases the Divine light within, the Light that returns to its original nature of being One with the Divine.
"When all ego and its wishes,when all personal will is left behind through the blessing of HAQQ, the Truth, and when they submit their wills to the will of Allah and are pleased with all that comes from Allah, their color turns to white light... but the ones who the limits of this path has neither form nor shape nor color. He becomes as fi a ray of sunshine.The sunshine is colorless... the dervish who has reached the highest level has no being to reflect light or color. If anything, his color would be black, which absorbs all light. This is the sign of the state of annihilation." ...Describing the final stages of attainment in Sufism. 
What happened to the historical Buddha or Gautama after he attained 'Pari Nirvana' or the final stage of enlightenment? Did he simply vanish from existence into emptiness or void? When asked of God and the afterlife, the Buddha was said to have merely smiled the 'half smile', of which it was interpreted as giving no answer in the most polite way of understanding the Truth. The Buddha's teachings were for this worldly life based on His first declare that 'Life is Suffering' of the the Four Noble Truth. He did not declare the Gods or God created life as suffering, but simply being born as a human is the cause for suffering. For so long as there is an"I' in our consciousness, we will suffer. In another saying He was said to have uttered. " Suffering Is, None who suffers!, and Nirvana Is, and none who attains it." The Way of the Buddha as i understand it to be does not negats God nor does he affirm the existence of one. "God has no problem, it is human who has the problem of being born in this world." The Buddha was born in a society where there existed thousands of Gods and Goddesses as practiced in Hinduism and He set out to find the Truth about human existence and overcome the bonds of suffering that we are dealt with in this life.
Islam as the final of the the major religions of humanity, through the revelations of the Quran and the teachings of the last Prophet to walk the earth, caps up all our faith and belief systems Uniting together all the faith and teachings throughout human history into One. 
"The beloved Messenger of Allah is the light of the Truth, for Allah says, We sent thee not but as a mercy to the whole creation..."
(Sura Anbia,107)

Lessons from the Bamboo Hut.

Throughout my nights of Virgil,(actually hard to sleep), I sat and meditate in my bamboo hut and contemplated upon my past and present status of being who i am. The bamboo floor makes it most uncomfortable to sleep and this actually forced me to stay awake despite my being so tired and worn out from the physical labor that i did during the day time clearing the whole area of the organic farm. The words of The sheikh, Qadir Al-Jilani came to mind as i sat there tossing and turning in my mind, "Secluson and solitude should be viewed as states of both exterior and interior withdrawal. The exterior state of seclusion is when a man decide to withdraw himself from the world, imprisoning himself in a space away from other people, so that people in the world are saved from his undesirable character and existence. he also hopes that in so doing the source of his undesirable existence, his ego and the base desire of his flesh , will be separated from their daily nourishment and the satisfaction of things they are used to. Further he hopes that this isolation will educate his ego and his appetites, permitting the development of his inner spiritual being." These words reminded me of why or what i was attempting to do being where i was. The prophet of Allah was quoted as saying," The faithful is he from whose hand and tongue the other faithful are safe."... FromThe Secret of Secrets, by Hadrat Sheikh Qadir Al-JIlani.
 I finally decided to pray the 'tahajub' or night prayer of two rakaats. After this i found my self in a state of bliss and quietude and my thoughts became more lucid and clear revealing some answers to my inquiries about myself. it came in the form of how Islam and Buddhism has so many connections when one connects the dotted lines. Most significant of all was the fact that in Islam one has to end in a state of emptiness of being in order to unite with Al-Hak, or the Owner, the One that all things return to.
In Buddhism the Buddha expounded the cessation of all, including the idea of having a 'self'. he was said to have uttered" I, Am No More." when He departed this life. The Buddha's teachings was for this Life and how to navigate oneself free from its bondage of ignorance to Liberation from its cycle of life and death. Islam is a religion of Unity of The One, none truly exist but Allah hence one has to become empty or nothing before one can become united with the Creator. 
To be contd;   

A rwetreat to where the Roosters still Crows at Dawn.

I am back at my retreat at SRI LOVELY, the organic farm for the last few days and have been working my body till I came down with a fever upon waking up this morning. Why I keep coming here and suffer all kinds of physical discomfort is beyond me, but suffice to say that it is much more pleasant to wake up to the call of the creatures of the forest than to the siren of an ambulance or the police making a delivery of the convicts like they always do. I sit a whole lot more here in the middle of the night listening to the frogs and the night birds calling out to whatever that they call out to. I am out in the boonies and it is a pleasant change that I much needed. The air is a whole lot more fresher in comparison to what I left behind and the water allot more natural as it comes right out of the ground except when it rains. The meals comes in from outside through the Captain's wife or brought in bought from local food stalls.
My job primarily is as the grounds keeper and what i do mostly is to chop down and clear all the overgrown weeds and is essence make the place more presentable. Hard sweaty work and my body is being put through the grind and what with sleeping on bamboo floor with a just a thin layer of futon cover for bedding. My physical form went through a tremendous screaming aching pain every time i wake up in the morning or the middle of the night. I sit, and i meditate on my aches and pains until i was able to or forced to lay down due to lower back pain from sitting too long and my mind went for a spin with question and answers wondering what in heaven's name was i doing there in the first place. Sitting in the semi darkness of the hut i contemplate my status in life, i was accompanied by "The Secret of Secrets," a book on the works by the Greatest Sufi mystique of all times, The sheikh, Hadrat Abdul Qadir Al Jilani, ( May Allah Sanctify his secret.)
Ever since I was introduced to His works by my teacher and friend, the late Yusof Ali, I have been brought closer to Islam in its deeper meanings beyond just rituals and blind faith. I do not intend to spend too much time relating his life story here although it makes for one very interesting reading for those interested in Islamic mysticism or Sufism. There is a a great many selection of writers and commentaries on his works on the Internet and it will be an enlightening experience no doubt for those who are seeking the truth in themselves or in their belief and faith. For those who are seeking to understand Islam itself better, the works of Sheikh Qadir Jilani will lift up some veils about the religion that is not found elsewhere and perhaps will shed a new light on the meaning of the word Unity in the religious context of World Religions.  

" When the light from Allah(Who) is the light of the heavens and the earth...begins to shine upon the regions of your heart. the lamp of the heart will be lit...."

I am woken up by the crowing of roosters that were perched on the branches of the trees all over the compound starting with one and answered by the rest announcing the arrival of another new day. This I have heard very rarely if ever living in the city like Georgetown where i would be woken up by the sound of traffic and people preparing food for the restaurant below my window at Sungai Pinang. Not a thing wrong with waking up to the sound of sirens and honking of cars and motorcycles, but waking up to the sounds of roosters and birds seems much more healthier.

Time to take a break.

The subject of human consciousness is now an ever growing subject across the globe and in all walks of life at the very least among those who can excess the Internet and capable of putting together their own thought process. I find it for myself over the years that most of what i thought were just my own fumbling around about this issues that I had over simplified; just abstractions. Today as i view and listen to various thoughts and ideas made available by the Internet via You Tube and so forth, i find the i was not that far off the target and these thoughts and ideas albeit spiritual or scientific echos my very own thoughts and feelings all along, so much so that i feel like i am echoing them. I am glad that this Blog has such a long span of life, more than 10 years of my life since i first began to lay my thoughts down in writing as it proves to me that i was already on the path towards digging for truth before You Tube has been inundated by these very same issues.
I am glad that i had stumbled upon the thoughts and ideas of the likes of Alan Watts and J.Krishnamurti way back since the late 1970s and that i had kept up to date with my own personal life as i get older now reflecting more and more upon what is the nature of Truth. Today with the touch of my finger tip i can excess all that i wish to understand of Einstein's theories of Bohm's, listen to Sad Guru Jagi Dev or Mooji, it is all out there put in myriads of ways. I am very fortunate to have come such a long way in living my life as Mahatma Gandhi had suggested; a life is lived like an experiment. I have put myself through the test tubes and Bunsen burners and i have tasted all that life had to offer from the most expensive restaurants to being a homeless, a good Samaritan to being a charlatan, a charitable person to being a thief; in short i have committed the worse and the best all along and these are my grist for the mill. my motive has always been to discover who I am and what is it all about, this existence and how i fit in with the scheme of things with the whole Universe. 
What I had started off a a form of sharing with my loved ones, my children and theirs has now become an almost worldwide reading for those who have the time and interest. I am still on the road to find out and far from reaching my final destination, perhaps i never will, suffice to say that I have learned a great deal by exposing myself and how i can easily be looked upon as a copy cat or having plagiarized thoughts and ideas from others via the Internet and so forth. Yes i have and no i have not, nothing i can think of is of my own, nor is there anything that i have written comes from what is out there or written by someone else, even as i am typing out these words like i am right now, there is now references in front of me and I can keep on writing for as long as i want to till they closes the office of the Internet shuts down. Yes i wish I had been writing some fantasy novel instead and make myself a fortune. But it was not my intention, i started this process in order that i may learn to heal my splintered soul; know who i truly am. The thought and ideas plagiarized or otherwise are all there buried in my mind just like files to be excess to at my will. I find the only problem I have in writing is to write or not to, is it worth my time anymore sitting here and letting my mind run itself through my fingertips.
Perhaps it is time to wind down and put it all to rest as i have said more than care to of my search for answers; there is no more to share except the final cut when it comes. Hence i will retreat from making any more entries until there is something worth to write about comes along. Time to move no and explore new horizons or different dimensions of my existence. It has been a great experience in sharing with all those who have been reading my blog thus far and I feel honored that you have cared to take the trouble to and i hope it has been helpful in some small ways for you and your search. My love goes out to all of you till then.

Tabula Rasa...

Talk is cheap, bu to put all that I have learned and understood is a whole different game altogether. Hurdles upon hurdles lay in my path especially those that were from the past. Funny how the wrongs that I committed stands out like sore thumbs and comes to surface so readily at the slightest trigger by an image or a thought. We all carry our own crosses whether we believe in crucifixes or not, or better yet we all carry our own baggage on our backs till we bend over in our old age. So how do we unload these burden that has been clinging on to us from the moment of their inception into our consciousness. What is even more tragic is that we carry the burden of others often against our very own will out of love, out of compassion which is not too bad in itself, but out of guilt? How do we liberate our consciousness from these loads of karmic crap?
How do we live day to day moment to moment with a 'tabula rasa' or a clean slate?

ta·bu·la ra·sa

ˈtäbyo͝olə ˈräsə,ˈräzə/

noun

1. an absence of preconceived ideas or predetermined goals; a clean slate.

   "the team did not have complete freedom and a tabula rasa from which to work"

   • the human mind, especially at birth, viewed as having no innate ideas.

   
   

How do we free our mind from being embroiled with past experiences or how do we remain like an empty sky instead of littered with drifting clouds, how do we remain calm as the ocean instead of being thrashed about by waves. In short how do we remain in the here and now, in some form of meditative state that is free from intrusions by external vexations. The simplest response that comes to my mind is to breath and be aware of every single breath that I take, breathing in and breathing out. When asked most individuals would admit that in the course of a day most are not aware that they are breathing; the most crucial activity in our lives we take for granted. The breath is our connection to or the bridge between our consciousness and the rest of the Universe of not our fellow sentient beings.

I have made it an effort to keep in touch with my breathing as much as I possibly can throughout my day and especially when i have an issue to deal with. Most often than not i have come to notice that whenever i take a deep breath while in a state of agitation or confusion my mind will switch from chaotic state to a more calm state of clarity. I call this a step back or a retreat from what is before me. This inadvertently leads on to the practice of patience which often gives one a second look at what is truly present. A clouded mind is the result of not breathing properly which in simple term means there is too much carbon dioxide and less oxygen in your body. Proper breathing also allows for the body to gain proper alignment like sitting up straight instead of slouching, gaining proper weight distribution which makes the body weightless with no pressure being imposed upon one part to compensate for another. The human form is so perfectly constructed that if and when properly utilized it becomes light; the lightness of being.

Pranayama Yoga or the Yoga of breath management is one form of practice that can help to ensure that out breathing process becomes a healing process to the body, mind and spirit. It is the very key to our existence. We function a whole lot better when our breath is in rhythm with that of the Universe and the rest of humanity. It helps to remind us that we breath the same air as much as we drink the same water and feel the heat of the same sun upon our bodies as we consume the same food produced from the very same earth that we live on; in essence we are One.

When all our minds are centered upon this single realization, we can heal the world, we can change the chaotic confusion into an ordered more productive and creative existence. Breathing in unison helps for us to remain focused into the here and now, however it will take conscious practice and awareness for this to happen and as more of us becomes aware the stronger our bonds would be in our effort to heal this troubled Planet. When the individual mental thought processes are being dropped off, the Mind that is present is united with the Whole and become and instrument of Collective Consciousness capable of making great changes in our lives. We were not born politicians, soldiers, scientists and so forth; we were born with a clean slate. We become what we are today through a long process of conditioning, but we can act as born again beings with no preconditions if we only learn to awaken to this reality; this is a part of Liberation of being Free. Only with this state of consciousness can we act Collectively.

   

Choose languageAfrikaansAlbanianAmharicArabicArmenianAzerbaijaniBasqueBelarusianBengaliBosnianBulgarianBurmeseCatalanCebuanoChinese (Simplified)Chinese (Traditional)CorsicanCroatianCzechDanishDutchEsperantoEstonianFilipinoFinnishFrenchGalicianGeorgianGermanGreekGujaratiHaitian CreoleHausaHawaiianHebrewHindiHmongHungarianIcelandicIgboIndonesianIrishItalianJapaneseJavaneseKannadaKazakhKhmerKoreanKurdishKyrgyzLaoLatinLatvianLithuanianLuxembourgishMacedonianMalagasyMalayMalayalamMalteseMaoriMarathiMongolianNepaliNorwegianNyanjaPashtoPersianPolishPortuguesePunjabiRomanianRussianSamoanScottish GaelicSerbianShonaSindhiSinhalaSlovakSlovenianSomaliSpanishSundaneseSwahiliSwedishTajikTamilTeluguThaiTurkishUkrainianUrduUzbekVietnameseWelshWestern FrisianXhosaYiddishYorubaZulu

Take care of number one.

The Buddha expounded some two thousand five hundred years ago the importance of being born in this life as a human being, for it is in this form of existence that sentient beings have the greater opportunity to be liberated from this circle of life, death and rebirth, "So in this human form do not waste time." These may not be his exact words but safe to say that this was what he meant. Human beings however are today blind to this warning and most live in the so called pursuit of happiness in the material realm of existence thus neglecting the quest for truth and reality as it truly is. Most of us become so entrapped in our quest for wealth and fame and a other forms of creature comforts that we mostly live like the three blind mice. We become so engrossed in our belief that our existence is purely survival of the fittest that we fail to feel the sorrows of those who are not as fortunate, the downtrodden and the destitute. We are so jaded in our ways that we ignore what happens to the environment around us; yes are led by Greed , Hate and Delusions like cattle to the slaughter house.
Liberation does not happen just because we die or cease to exist, liberation is a lifetime process of awakening moment to moment from the deep sleep that most of us are presently encountering. We are most of us in deep slumber and every now and then we awaken when something out of the ordinary hits us in the head for better or worse. A natural disaster, an economic melt down, a death in the family and so forth, then we are rudely awakened to have a glimpse of reality and realize how fragile we all are. Till this moment in time , while everything is moving along as we pretty much expected, there is food on the table, roof on top of our head and a steady income, we are a satisfied lot. Life boils down to the fulfillment of these simple needs, however there are many who are never satisfied with what is enough and crave for more believing that it is their birthright. When enough is never enough, this is when the trouble with humanity begins and it start with each and everyone of us. We are each and everyone of us a member of humanity and we are personally responsible for the making or breaking up of this world of ours. 
Hence when each and everyone of us make it an effort and practice to discover what is the truth for ourselves,all the unanswered questions that has been plaguing us throughout our lives then we will inevitably help to heal the planet and humanity itself. Then we are broken free from the conditioning that the powers that be has imposed upon us, the conditioning that has led us to become like cattle headed for the slaughter house. This is simply because knowing the truth for yourself  shatters all the delusions that has been created around you and in doing so you will view the plight of mankind and the Planet itself as needing the same kind of regenerating form of healing; a revival of the Human Spirit.. "And the Truth shall set you Free!" And the truth is not out there, it resides within and it is for you to awaken to its presence and manifest it in the lives of others as a collective healing process. 
This life of ours does not belong to you and i alone, it belongs to Humanity, to the Universe, it is answerable to the One and the One only by whatever name you may call  It or Him or Her. It is only by the presence of a higher power that that our collective ego will know restrain, until we have come to be able to act or manifest without a hint of our personal ego being involved, we will serve the highest order and heaven and hell becomes reward and punishment, fear and comfort becomes our daily choices. To know who we are is to be free of our egotistical tendencies, our claim of a birthright over others, our lordship in the scheme of things. This is why the Buddha also expounded that in the end there is really no 'Self', When there is no self, there is none to suffer. For so long as there is a you and an i, we will exist like in a dream, or unconsciousness, we become victims of our own ignorance. We become insensitive to the ties we have with the rest of the Universe and we live to merely take care of who we think we are; taking care of number one. 

Another Death in the family.

One of my cousin's wife passed away yesterday or brain hemorrhage and I went to Sitiawan, a small town on the west coast al area of the State of Perak where they were living. She was according to the note by her bad 61 years of age or 6 years younger than I am and it made me reflect about my status having lived for the past 67 years, what is it all about? My cousin her husband was devastated by the loss and when i first sat beside him on the floor where he was moaning about being lonely without her and so forth, i told of how i felt having lost my wife and not being able to be by her side when it happened and how I have for the past few years been living and accepting the loss hoping that it help him to feel not so alone. I reminded him of his children and grandchildren who will need him for so long and he is alive, telling him more or less to accept and move on. He is "The Pilot of Lumut" an entry I made in my blog a year or two ago when i followed him on board a Russian vessel "The Eagle", which he piloted out of the Lumut Harbor. 
Witnessing the process of death and dying has always moved me at my deeper levels and still having unanswered questions about who i am or where i am  at this moment in time, my belief, my faith and most of all my understanding about life itself. As i listened to the sermon read by the grave reminding the deceased of what lies ahead no that she is laid in the grave and giving her instructions on how to face the two angels who will question her as soon as everyone has left the cemetery and so forth, I asked myself the same questions. If one needs a miracle in life this is the moment  when one needs it most. If there is any mystery about death and what happens after this is the moment when truth can never be known except by those who have died. Here logic comes into confrontation with faith, fear and confusion is overcome by one's complete surrender to Allah's Will, if one is a True Muslim. My cousin's wife died while still coma or under sedation and thus by all counts she died unconsciously or did she?
Most religions have some form of guidance as to how to face the after death moments or while in transition in the grave from one state into another and Islam has a very thorough revelation on this matter. The Quran and the teachings of the Prophet of Allah has included this instructions for all Muslims. The Tibetan Book of the Dead and the Egyptian Book of the Dead provides similar instructions for their departed souls. For those who holds no belief whatsoever like the Atheist, this would not be problem as for them death is just another passing phase in life. For those who practice the belief in Incarnation or life after life evolution the matter is different from those who accept the reality of Heaven and Hell. The question is still unanswered for most of us especially now that  scientific studies are making discoveries that adds to more questions unanswered.
Whatever the case may be, death is still a dark mystery to most and likewise most of us lives in denial that death will one day put all the questions before us and it is a matter of time. The acknowledgment of the inevitability of death for me is a reality check that makes me feel like i am not altogether in charge of my own existence. That i am here on loan, to serve my time as best i can and be of service to all sentient beings around me, help to ease the burden of others and not add on to the misery that comes with ignorance. As nothing is permanent in this life, death reminds me not to be greedy or cling on to what i have, death reminds me of my own fragility and helplessness. It helps to keep my arrogance and heedlessness in check, it reminds me the true meaning of the idiom... and this too will pass.