I am the one that observes and witness all that is and all that is is a manifestation of my own mental formations, my projections and my perceptions and imaginations. I am the unborn and death does not touch me except in when the time time to change happens and i move on for this physical form to another perhaps in a whole other dimension of existence, until comes a time when I find liberation from this cycle of life death and rebirth. I am the continuing golden thread that penetrates through eternity unbroken, I am the eternal soul that the Lord had created and sent forth into this realm of causal effects, the realm trials and tribulations we call life. I am neither attached to nor detached from this existence, I am the observer, the witness of the Dharma unfolding and disappearing, rising and falling away. I am just a window through which that which is within sees what is out there; I belong to none and nothing belongs to me, I place none above me nor any below.
This is how i see myself as I am not this body nor am I even the mind. The mind and body are my tools of expression, of manifestation of touching what is before me real or otherwise. This is what I have understood to be my goal in practicing meditation and mindfulness in my daily activities. I observe life with detached involvement not stained by what I experience one way or another, seeing all is illusion, unreal although seemed real. I avoid as much I can from clinging on to what is the impermanent and let go of what is of no relevance to my growth in spirit and soul. Life is my testing ground to live to the fullest of possibilities and yet not being sucked into its karmic pull and become an added baggage to my already full load. There is no escape to gathering 'stuff along this path we are treading as we live our daily life since the day we were conceived. Through learning, adapting and assimilating we grow into adulthood accumulating stuff adding t our mind the stimulus played out before our eyes, our senses. The whole idea of meditation is to unburden, to let go of to discard and detach from all the stimulants that we experience day in day out.
I can safely say that my second awakening happened when i saw snowflakes floating down from the dark grey empty skies of Wisconsin cold; I experienced the deepest jolt of energy that had helped me to survive the years of my life living in the United States. I was sitting on the thick carpet floor of mother in law's house, The late Beatrie Goerst who took my family and I in our first year or so of our beginning in the US. Green Bay, Wisconsin a town, city that sits right on the edge of Lake Michigan, where the coldest and meanest winters can be experienced. My mother in law worked for the Farrs family at Farr's Grove, in Duck Creek, Brown County, Green Bay. The Farrs were my adopted family who cared for my family and my welfare in one way or another. All these acceptance happened after I had my mini Satori, I would like to call it. As I watched the snowflakes drifting like ball of cotton the size of my palm snapped my consciousness into a standstill mode where I felt like I am present in a vacuum state. The sounds from the TV of the Gilligan's Island, black and white series simply went silent, I only emptiness within and without, I snapped, I got up dressed in my sarong and T-Shirt I rushed outside past my first wife doing the dishes in the kitchen, only catching the tail end of something she was yelling about at me and I stepped out on to the small patch of green lawn behind my mother in law's house. I stood in the center with y arms spread and my head pointed up at the sky with my mouth wide open and tongue sticking out, I tried to catch the snowflakes in my mouth. I was dancing in circles with outstretched arms until i hear a loud yell from Beatrice Goerst, who was standing with her hands on her hips; I felt at home immediately!
I do not wish to go into the details of it because I must have written this episode in my life several times already in the past post of this Blog. I just love the fact that I was on the brink of madness and insanity was made to awakened from the nightmare I was in; Green Bay became my second home henceforth, three and half years a a meat cutter in the Packing house, almost five years worth of College life as a student at the University of Wisconsin, Green Bay, a Security Guard Services, J and J Securities and the rest was living the life of a Bum and today I call being and artist, the Art of Living,(as an artist). In this life I direct my own movies, I am the Director of my mini series, my life in Green Bay was one of pride and passion of what Van Gogh might have felt in his life or trials and tribulations to be taken seriously as an artist and a visionary. It has taken me over seventy years to make this claims but they are claims made for me by me. I have proven to myself that i can make some sense out of all these nonsense, to at the very least know for myself who I truly am, how far or how near am I to that which I long for. On that afternoon of my first year of winter in green bay Wisconsin, I became a man who stepped out of his skin as a boy.
" I felt a gentle voice telling me, you are now in a new environment where no too many really know who you are or what you can become if and when you put your mind to it,"Tepok dada, tanya selera!" as the Malay saying goes. Beat your chest and fulfill your appetite, hold nothing back. No one knows how weak or how strong you are or what you are capable of. I was time to drop all my old youthful baggage and took a giant step in the adult father life to afour month old boy, my first born and his mother who patiently stood by all my errors and failings as I later dealt with as I stepped into Green Bay Meats and Cold Storage owned by the Frankenthal Family. I was being baptized with the blood of cattle daily sometimes for eleven hours a day. The experience of working in a meat packing plant along with rows of some eighty men and women boning beef was my lesson of both survival and decadence. I was battering my soul for the temporary of getting drunk after work with the guys and thinking it was all for the survival of my family. I was just another salary man as the Japanese would call me; in short I became worse than the cattle that i was boning, physically, mentally and worse of all spiritually.
It was not until i was talked into joining the University as a student and see where it would take me. By then my wife and I had decided it was best to lead our own lives separately for the benefit of all involved especially my son. I did not contest for custody as I had told my wife before we decided to divorce, that she would need him more than I will. I think I had made the right decision as my first went on to become a Flight Captain for the Emirates Air out of Dubai and my wife is doing very well. I have drifted far from what i had intended to share and well it does not really matter anymore...for now.
#greenbaywisconsin,#uwgb, farrsgrovegr.bay,
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