Two more days to go - Ramadan.

 And what have I learned from having fasted for almost a month now? Highly doubtful that it makes me a better Muslim, who am I kidding? A better person? Perhaps, but not to the extent that i would be given wings. Nah, I am still who I am not much change where life is concern except that my one big snag is that I need to have a better car now as my present one is on the brink of a lock down as the engine is smoking like a train as I drive down the road and now i have cars following me at a greater distance than is normal. She is old no doubt and should have been retired to the car heaven sometime ago, but I am in no position to purchase anything beyond one or two thousand much less a car, even a used one. COVID has its silver lining in some ways as I always maintain, the cleaner environment, the lesser vehicles on the the road, the, closer bonding in the family unit, the better survival of the wild life and the slowdown of the big rush of life itself for us humans. For old farts like me this is good, its timely and it makes a whole lot of sense. A few years ago when we moved into this apartment I told myself never to work anymore at least not for anyone, or even earn a living like ordinary folks. I told myself that i am taking a leave of absence from the life out there and focus on the life in here. Little did i imagine that my wishes has been granted in more than one ways, I am now stuck like a hermit in a cave o my own making. Not bad really seeing that i have been able to come to grips with allot of my habits and tendencies and see them for what they are. 

Being a recluse has its advantages as one becomes more in tune with what is than what is out there. There is lesser and lesser thoughts to be entertained when there is less and less relationships to entertain. These days the mind is focused on relationships that truly matters like bonding with my adult children and accepting them and their ways with ope heart and clear conscience. Making sure that they eat well and spend their hard earned income to better themselves healthwise and keeping their psycho-emotional state in a more stable and reliable form. Sharing what is pertinent to life spiritually and socially in a more relaxed and give and take, win win manner which is called by the Buddha called by skillful means. Being a guardian and a friend rather than a father or a parent. Learning even at my old age that i can be wrong and it is okay to be ignorant sometimes as it gives others the chance to be wise for your sake. That it is okay to be needy sometimes as it allows for others to be beneficent and charitable, that it is okay to loose when you see there a whole to be gained through acceptance of losses. Hence here I am, a few days to go, fasting as best i can on this fasting Month of Ramadan.

The essence of the purpose for fasting as I might have mentioned before is to confront and annihilate the egotistical tendencies inherent in us. Yes it is the  clarion call that has been made throughout the ages by practically all spiritual leaders and religious faith. 

"Faqala ana Rabbukumu la- 'ala (79:24). Ego has a big Claim. It wants to be God itself. It claims that It is God. Don't say La illa haillaAllah, I am here! Say. Laillaha illa nafsi, there is not God but my ego. Accept my Lordship. Accept my Divinity. I will not be pleased if you accept someone else." ...from talks by Shaykh Nazim's SaltnatTV.

Ego is full of disloyalty and evil. Don't look for evil elsewhere. why do you look for evil somewhere else when you have its source in you.

The Peophet of Allah (PBUH) has said," Lord, protect me from my ego. Don't leave me even for a blink of an eye."

Azazzil who later was known as Satan was said to be the most devoted worshiper of the Lord, He did not fell from Grace because of any worldly affections but because of His ego in assuming that His devotion to God entitles Him not to bow to Adam

"Ara'aitaka hadha lladhi karamtaa 'alayya." (17:62)

" Look, You created him from clay just now. He hasn't promise to You yet. He hasn't prostrated to You yet, Despite all my worship You have not grant me this respect and instead honored this one and You dressed him with the attribute to be Your Khalifa."

Yes the gist of the matter is that the ego has to go and as someone pointed out, drop the 'E' and go! The fasting month has been quite an experience this time around and I have the feeling that I may see the rewards in some small ways later, just loosing some weights if nothing else or discovering that i do have the chances yet of becoming a good Muslim.

As The End Approahes- Ramadan

Has been a while however it is never too late to listen to Kitaro's "Matsuri" on You Tube while I allow my mind to drift on the COVID19 Saturday Morning. I had just sat facing the panoramic view of the Penang Hills and was blessed with a clear rainbow that from one end to the other arching over the Kek Lok Si Temple with the 60 feet standing Kwan Yin statue that completes the whole picture. Earlier as I was walking towards the stairs where i would sit, I had to free a pigeon from being trapped in a net hanging from the ceiling. The bird was flapping its wings in a desperate attempt to escape from the predicament it was in and as soon as I ripped the net from its foot she took off after dropping a few floors downwards towards the ground. I had not wanted to share the morning initially but simply kept it to myself as the morning's gift from the Universe, or was it from the Goddess of Mercy, Herself, however I decided that good positive feelings should be shared no matter how trivial it may seem as we face all the negativity that is being thrown at us from the world out there. 

One of the reasons for my writing and posting my thoughts and experiences all these years is to share with all those who take the trouble to read these little episodes in my life that otherwise would have simply vanish with time and never to be thought of, lost in memory. What did it felt like to watch a pigeon hanging upside down flapping its wings in a desperate attempt to free itself. I felt fear in the bird and in myself and I felt as though it was meant to be that happen to decide in doing my morning routine than went back to sleep as I almost did. I felt the bond between us as I know that i have been feeding this same bird along with the rest from the neighborhood almost everyday with my leftovers. I felt the nagging in my mind stopped and the migraine and lack of energy and enthusiasm slipped away replaced by a more exuberant state of, "hell yea, it's beautiful morning and good to be awake to watch the sun rise and the birds sing all around me: then as I sat came the rainbow! It was a care package of positive vibes to help pass yet another day in the COVID prison. May all beings in the six realms and ten directions enjoy the day and may all their suffering be lightened.

Love is the key, the essence the net that holds together the 'whole' that we truly are, the wise ones has been saying for eons and yet man creates formless demons to destroy their fellow man all in the name of control. COVID19 is man made, created in a lab for the purpose of mass control. It is an experimental virus that has gone awry, out of control and as a result has spread like wid fire and not even the antidote that was created to maintain as a safe guard over its spread is proving useless; it is like a runway train that is loaded with toxic chemicals running down its track towards a final destructive end. There s no justification for this manifestation of inhumane act of mass destruction of lives except for the greed for power and the ultimate egotistic need to dominate. Only a Godless, soulless regime is capable of such atrocity of mass genocide. I always ask myself ,who stands to profit from this mess we find ourselves in and why are we as a specie with all ur great minds and technology are not able to track down the culprit who set it all in motion. The answer I can come up with to satisfy myself is Dajjal or the Anti Christ and it may sound as far out there by a long sane shot, I cannot see any other schemer of such a grand scale capable of or dare to bring humanity to its knee.

I know most who read this would be skeptical and by right they should as for along time now throughout our human history we have been led by our nose towards the fulfillment of an agenda set about by the our dark side our shadow and this shadow goes by different names as many as God goes by different names and in different guises. Man has been lulled to sleep ever since the battle for the control of our destiny and that of the planet was set between light and darkness, God and Satan, angels and demons. The shedding of human blood all over the world has become a common phenomena as wars continue to claim lives and create havoc and misery. The planet faces one man made disaster  after another making it an added cause for the decadence and eventual demise of species, but most of us are oblivious to what we are manifesting, too busy taking care of number one; self preservation and survival of the fittest, the all mighty ego. 

Thus spoke my paranoid mind for lack of better thoughts to share and this too will pass as they say, the COVID, the wars, the Famine, the environmental degradation, the self mortification, it wiil all pass or I will pass on. However in the meantime the same ol same ol thoguhts will cirurlate and be regurgitate like the drifting of the plastic waste in the world oceans floating and drifting following the currents whereever it flows. What a waste of human potential, human probabilities and abilities, what a waste of good food and good wine and good woment to come to this after all these years of drifting. Time will tell as time will heal and mend a broken spirit and time will take its toll before it forever is lost into oblivion. The fasting month can bring the est and the worse out of a person and there three more days before it is over when we celebrate the Eid Fitri to commemorate the end of the fasting month of Ramadan.

     

"The Color Purple" - Against all odds.

 'The Color Purple" a novel by Alice Walker made into a movie by Steven Spielberg tells of the endurance of two sisters who grew up in the South and were separated by fate and unfortunate events in their lives. Played by Danny Glover and Whoopie Goldberg in the leading roles the movie to me is a classic that encapsulates the spirit of the Colored South. The movie tells of the strength and deep faith that the African American had to keep them struggling to survive while enduring the post slavery age in their history and the history of the Southern States. It exposes the raw deals that the Black families subjected to while crawling out from under the foot stools of the Whites as well as their own family traumas due to ignorance and social pressures. The African Americans has proven that perseverance and resilience in spirit can overcome all odds and adversities no matter how harsh and bitter life can be. Hope is hope no matter how small and bleak it may seem, it was hope that kept Ms.Celie alive and enduring the abuses of her husband,the hope that she would one day see her sister Ms.Nettie and her children again and she would triumph over it all at the end of the day.

"The Color Purple documents the traumas and gradual triumph of Celie, an African American teenager raised in rural isolation in Georgia, as she comes to resist the paralyzing self-concept forced on her by others. Celie narrates her life through painfully honest letters to God."...Britannica.

The story by Alice Walker and co-authored by Oprah Winfrey I feel is a must read for college literature and cultural studies of the post Slavery life the African Americans or the South. It may be a work of fiction, but it has all the ear marks of a cultural history that began at the very root of the family life and expanded into the society at large reflecting a struggle for a cultural heritage that would lay claim in history as a triumph of the human spirit against all odds. It is a story that could be told of by any given society anywhere on this planet. It is a microcosmic drama played out at the most raw and sensitive level of the human emotional and psychological family level to the level of a community as well as into the macrocosmic level of the global level. Notches in the tree of life of the African American history captured on a screen by great minds that pooled together such as Director Steen Spielberg and Producer Quincy Jones and superb actors such as Danny Glover, Whoopie Golberg and Oprah Winfrey, and many others that played major and linor role in this movie to bring it to life a documentary of a piece of human history.

The geniuses who told stories.

 My daughter brought home a few second hand novels from the Sunday market at the Hin Bus Depot where she herself was selling face masks produced by her company: Marimask. I just finished reading the first, The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle by Hugh Lofting published by Yearling. It was a refreshing fast read as it took one on a fantasy adventure that needed not much thinking. The book about a Naturalist, Dr. Dol;ittle, brought back my childhood memories of the children adventure stories that i had read, books like those by Enib Blyton, Mark Twain, Rudyard Kipling and the likes; I was an avid reader at a very early age and my English language subject had won me many awards at the end of the year on Parents' Day. Reading saw me through my teenage years while living on the East Coast in Kuala Terengganu where i was exposed to numerous novels of all kinds thanks to my oldest brother who was also my English teacher at the Sultan Sulaiman Secondary School. He had spent several years in England and upon his return home had brought back with him two large suitcases of novels which he had hidden under his bed as most of these were considered not suitable for an average teenager for their erotic nature. This however only had my curiosity fired up and I stole into thee suitcases and devoured as many of the literature as i could. Hence My English subject improved tremendously only it was not as well appreciated in school  when the English teacher was your older brother.

I was reading the likes of James Michener,s "Hawaii", "Alaska" "Chesapeak" and a few others, or Harold Robbin's, "The Carpet Baggers," and "Tycoon. " Alistair McClean's many great thrillers like,"Ice Station Zebra", "Guns of Navarone", "Where Eagles Dare," most of which were later turned into epic movies with roles played by great actors such as Gregory Peck in the Guns of Navarone and Clint Eastwood in "Where Eagles Dare." I devoured James Clavell's, "Taipan" and "Shogun" within a short time  many other great writers of the time. I had spent hours of my time sitting under the, Flame of the Forest tree in front of my brother's teacher's quarters residence pouring through one novel after another oblivious to the world around me. In between reading my eyes would venture upon the horizon of the South China Sea that was set before me where I was sitting. This was when my mind developed the yearn to set out and venture beyond the horizon to discover what it was like to feel the snow under your feet or the warmth of the desert sand, the streets and sky scrappers of large cities where I had visited in my imagination while reading the novels. There is no doubt in my mind that reading had a great influence on my life and had planted the bug that led me to become footloose and fancy free while travelling the globe in my adult life. 

Reading of books especially novels has become a rarity as today's young adults are more immersed into the attractions of the Internet and various other outlets for entertainment other than the archaic paper backs. They would rather carry an I-pad or mobile phones with endless source of games and videos than lug around a thick novel. Finding a person with nose buried in a book in cafes is a rare sight these days and books are becoming more expensive due to the rise in cost to have them published. However I still love the feel of an old paperback novel in my hand and cherish the smell of the musty worn out pages, nothing like a second hand paperback to keep the mystery of life alive. The fact that book may have been read several others before you or where it has been before ending up in your hands is in itself a mystery. It is sad to say that minor mysteries like these are of no values to the young minds of today, that sense of awe about the ability to conjure up tales and stories that would entertain one in the privacy of one's own imagination is slowly is becoming a thing of the past. 

I feel much fortunate and obligated to those great writers whose works I had the opportunity to read in my younger days as they had fed my imagination and set me up to be able to be who I am today. I still marvel at their abilities to narrate such epic works as by J.R. Tolkien and J.K. Rowling that today has captivated the minds of millions around the world young and adults alike. Names like Tom Clancy and Robert Ludlum, Dan Brown and John Grisham has produced great movies from their novels and I feel most fortunate that in my lifetime I have been able to enjoy their works both as a reader as well as a movie buff. To witness the transformation of their literary works projected on to the silver screen is a marvel that still defies my imagination. If ther is anything to say spiritually I would say this is the result of a collective consciousness triggered by a great if not enlightened mind; these are geniuses of our times.        

   

What fb frienndships means to me.

  Of late I have been receiving many friendship requests from strangers mostly Malays in their middle age and most seem well educated and established in their lives and careers. I accepted quite a few thus far simply out of respect and curtsy lest I be deemed a fb snob. I also accepted these request out of curiosity to discover their story, what they have in mind, expect out me; their intentions. Most thus far are regular polite gentlemen and a few are most probably have the same reasons as I. I am slowly seeing an image of a middle class Malay men who perhaps bored like the rest of us for having to pretty much stay home due to COVID19 and have made the Face Book as well as other Internet links to while their time away. Some are genuinely looking for new friendships but most are out to check out as many characters that captures their curiosity, while many are showing off their place and positions, prowess and accomplishments in the Malay society. For me it is becoming a great cross cultural study and so I am choosing to entertain as many as i can afford to to add to fb collections of strangers who wish to know me. I get to to have a peek at their lifestyle and their personal characters, theri interests and how well informed they are and how well they communicate as middle aged, middle class working Malays.

As son as I have accepted them they would promptly message me to get to know me better, pry into my personal life with personal questions like, still married, how many children, still working? What  nationality exactly, and this they do right off the bat and I feel often like I was being interrogated by a country bumpkin. So I decided to poish up on my poor Malay and the art of communication with total strangers while in some small way try to educate them into observing some etiquette, or decorum when communicating especially with an elderly gentleman like myself. Where or when else do i get a chance to better myself at interpersonal communication especially with the Malay men who are mostly introverts, reserved in nature when talking about themselves to strangers, are very inquisitive about wanting to know about you and they pry almost rudely by Western standing. However i dont think this is done consciously and this is perhaps because of their lack of communicative experience when it comes to online meeting.

I am beginning t enjoy the age factor of being the elder in society which simply put,I dont give a hot what you think of me but mind your manners when you address me cause this age comes with a whole lot of knowledge and experiences both good and ugly and survived. Sometimes I forget what a demon I was and allow for the little petty tyrants of today run my life for me with their petty bullshit of trying to hoodwink the unfortunate and get away with it. However there is the other side of the coin that what a spiritual practice is hinged upon and that is detachment from all that is external in whatever colors shapes and forms; lest i forget. And so I am involved but detached from the involvement - detached involvement, plucking the lotus without getting my fingers wet, For the sake of the well being of the rest of sentient beings in this real of existence i will play the role of the ignorant clown and mingle with the crowd who knows one or two of God's creatures might be enlightened by my idiocy or inadvertently even find the door to liberation from this realm of delusion. 

"If manners maketh man, as someone says,

Then he is the hero of the day,

It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile,

Be yourself no matter what they say."...An Englishman in New York

-Sting. 

What's so great about Fasting?

 The fourteenth day of Ramadan and the cat woke me up with her loud meowing and mattress scratching to get my attention and it did like always. This morning as I struggled to the kitchen I found that her food was not the problem there was plenty left in her bowl and so the second problem was to be let out of the house and I did. Pigeons waiting of the roof for their breakfast and so I took care of that and there was enough for a load of laundry to be be run and so I took care of that. Then there were dishes that were sitting in the sink and the counters with left over food in them, so I took care of that too. While doing all these my head was like it was in a vise being squeezed from all sides but I continued to perform my tasks as a way of healing my body and mind and it worked; this was meditation in action. Headache gone, nasty thoughts gone and I got things done while listening to my cat howling for a mate as she was in her mating mood. It is a sad thing to hear and I blame God and Mother Nature for such cruelty towards animals. I should blame myself really for not getting her a male companion, but it is one of those mornings when things don't swing like you want them to.

Hunger pains brings out your sense of awareness more vividly as you go through the day not being able to eat or drink. No Panadol, no smokes, it makes you feel like you just want to hit the pillows again and not wake up till it is the end of the day when the azan for the maghrib prayer is heard from the State Mosque is heard to tell you that you can break your fast. However one can only sleep so much without creating a new ailment for the body and mind caused by too much laying on the bed. Perhaps it is symptoms of getting up there in age, these aches and pains, moans and groans with ever move one makes, like getting up or sitting down, perhaps it is the foretell of coming states of decadence and breakdown, perhaps it is just being in the seventies club...and your warranty is running out. Yes the fasting month brings out the best and the worse in you and all you have to do is to stay open and receptive to what is being revealed of who you are truly, your strength and weaknesses. 

On the othr hand the fasting month also evokes the consciousness of being compassionate owards others especially those who are in need, the poor and poverty striken. Compassion towards the victims of wars and destruction natural or otherwise and faces starvation due to these factors. Those who are conscientious and caring are more charitable towards their neighbors in need or the beggars they encounter on the street. Loving kindness becomes more readily revealed towards each other more so then it normally would be when one is fasting. When one is able to see the many positive virtues that fasting brings out in us collectively, it indeed makes a whole lot of sense that the fasting month of Ramadan is prescribe as one of the five pillars of Islam.  

He speaks we just don'''t listen.

 As I sat facing the hills lined with white concrete structures stretching before me the skies was blazing with crimson colors from the rising sun,  felt the sense of blissfulness for a short moment when all else dropped even God was absent. I felt the tranquility of being devoid of a single thought, only peace and clarity as though I was the 60 feet tall Kwan Yin, the Goddess of Mercy at the foot of the Kek Lok Si temple as She looks down with Compassion upon the largest Chinese cemetery of Batu Gantung; I listened to the myriads of birds songs welcoming the break of day and witness the changing colors all over the landscape stretching from the Jerejak Island to the Batu Gantung cemetery. The Penang Hills rises into the morning clear blue skies like a green wall fresh from the heavy rains of the past few days. I sat and allowed my mind to tell its stories one after another rising and fading away until there was none left but sound and sight of a new day, somewhere my cat Furby was meowing loud demanding attention and with a Gasho and a bowing before the entire Universe that had oened before i rose reluctantly; and this too will pass.

 Half the month of the month of Ramadan has gone by and my struggles with the Nafs ( ego) within has slowly began to subside for now and I feel like I am making a headway in reclaiming the sense of who I am. I fully realize that I am not giving it my fullest effort in observing all the precepts of the fasting month like a devoted Muslim should, but then again I am not a devout Muslim never was and never claimed to be and this I confess before my Lord and my Lord alone. However I feel His Divine Presence off and on in me and am grateful for His Grace and Blessings and I realize that i am at His mercy and compassion and that nothing, not a thing I say or do that does not come from Him and if you ask me as a Muslim who is my God, I say it He Allah (SHW), ask me as a Hindu I would say He is Brahman, the Supreme and Eternal Essence, if you are Christian I would say He is El Elohim, Adonai or if you be a Jew my Lord is the God of Abraham, Ishmael and Issac and the God of Moses, I call Him Jehovah; being converted to Islam I call my Lord, Allah. I am fasting in obseervation of one of the Mandates of my Lord which to me is a very pure cleansing and healing practice, a purification of my soul. in my effort to cleanse myself from the stains of spiritual transgressions in my life. In my life i have broken just about every precept and moral laws short of cold blooded murder and I have often enough times pointed my middle finger at God; I do have a heavy karmic debt to pay one way or another. 

I know I have a very long ride towards perdition here and in the hereafter for karma to play out itself but I hold on to one hope none the less, that the Al Mighty is compassionate and forgiving even for a damned soul like me and this faith I hold on to without doubt. Now after years of searching for answers and ways out of my self propagated suffering I a beginning to feel some small comfort in seeing the inner light burning again within me.I am catching glimpses perhaps of my liberation from the tangle that i am in all these years that very few really know of. It is like laying down the cross and removing the crown of thorns that i have been carrying and wearing as a symbol of penance and repentance. How I wish I could turn back the hands of time and walk a different path instead having driftted into the rut that i had led myself into all out of so much anger at myself and the world.

"Centered in stillness; meeting resistance with acceptance,

reveals and heals the persistence of the concealed." 

A quote I got from a post on Face Book by Jane Parry in a group I recently joined called, "An understanding of the words of the Gurus and sages of our time." as soon as I finished typing the last paragraph! Believe it or not! God speaks and if only we know how to listen.

      

Ramadan Ramblings

 Of late i have been having strange nightmares in my sleep state some were vivid while others though disturbing makes no sense. I decided to simply allow them to happen and not make too much fuss in trying to make sense about them. In my waking state too I am finding that more and more flotsam seems to drift before my mind, it is as though the more deeper  get into my meditative state, as I have been sitting much more regularly and with greater comfort and ease, the more there arise in my consciousness mental formations which often are random and of no significance whatsoever. Past traumas and dramas keeps popping up at the slightest suggestion triggered by just a single thought. The thing of it is, I am more attuned to these ongoings more so than ever before and am getting used to simply wave them hello and farewell almost instantaneously without much effort. Letting go of my attachments albeit physical, mental or emotional is becoming allot more easier and less of a struggle; sitting meditation during the month of Ramadan is proving to be a trip.

One of the reason we are asked to fast in Islam is the fact that fasting puts a choke hold on the ego. The ego is being put to the grind when dealing with hunger and thirst and when dealing with maintaining moral virtues especially restraining from even thinking upon such transgressions as sexual desires, lying and cheating or being simply dishonest with the world. Fasting  during the month of Ramadan is one of the most effective ways of bringing home one's moral and spiritual virtue as a human being. During this holy month even the worse of non believers take a hold of their appetites especially their carnal desires except for those whose agenda is set upon the destruction of the human spirit and these are the proxies of the demonic state doing the bidding of the ungodly their masters who according to the Islamic text are all reigned in and put on lock down in hell for the duration of the fasting month. Hence the Lord has given man a challenge for him to see his strength and weaknesses when all his actions are his own and not due to any influences or possessed by satanic or demonic entities. Man is tested to prove to himself that he can confront and overcome his weaknesses and transgressions of his own making on his own; there is no devil that made me do it.

Stuck between COVID19 and Ramadan, Muslims all ove the world are enjoying life no doubt especially those in the war zones of the Middle East and the African Continent. The Good Lord has His ways and mysterious as it is He likes to put some people and some nations to the test of faith, of suffering in order to wean out all those who are fakes and dires, those who claim to be good Muslims but are in effect having their fingers in the cookie jars hidden behind closed doors and those who truly touch their forehead to the ground while the sword hangs over their heads. I love being a homo sapiens in this day and age and what a world of illusion to live in with each and everyone dancing to their own tune of deception and decadence but hollering out loud over the air five times a day, how great God is. If asked how come we are in such a mess and they answer, it is written, it's the will of God, its destined its our karma; we re but pawn in the Game of Life, like prawns we are destined for the wok at the end of the day.

Most religious belief testifies that we live in a world of illusion, of maya, of make believe and that we are mostly sleep walkers drifting in space and time from one entanglement to another and sometimes stuck forever into one till death do us part. In Hinduism life is also known as Lila or the play (of Gods) and we are each and everyone playing our part while we are on stage. It is of no relevance whether we like or enjoy the roles we play or that we hate so much of being in a role of who we are for the Gods has made it so and it is written in the Book of Loh Mahfuz, the Book of Life. So suck it up and take it like a man this life is not permanent and it will end sooner or later for one and all, a matter of predestined time, when or where only God knows, perhaps just when you got it all figured out and boom!, you are history; Such Is, as the Buddha said. #ramadanramblings,

      

When all else fails - take a nap..

 As always in the past, the fasting month means simply means heavy duty migraine headaches especially upon waking up and wake up early I have as i have no choice for my wake up caller would not give up untill she got her cat food bucket filled. I am blessed even though it comes in a disguise of a pain in the neck cat that insist i get out of bed early and do my daily chores of the hour like sitting and physical exercise, doing the night piled up dishes and getting the laundry running afte feeding the pigions and watering the plants among other things needed to be taken care of. Always start the day off with a good long sitting whether inside or outside of the apartment where the sound of birds helps to clear the cobwebs in one's head. Sitting in meditation helps to realign the physical as well as the mental body and this simply means smoothing out the aches and muscle pains from the sleep as well as bringing the mental chattering to a gradual halt. If this is done often enough the morning part of one's day is something to look forward to despite or thanks to the nagging and demanding kitty cat named Furby.

She thinks that she is a pigion and can fly untll one day she fell twelve floors down to the ground below,. You think she would learn.

 The body goes through a major shakedown or so it seems durig the fasting month and the mind keeps making it harder and harder to make it through the day with all kinds of pokes like why? You are no true believer are you? Are you a good Muslim? Ever been? You don't pray like all good Muslims do, making up your own standards or so it seems, so why fast? Guilt? Fear? To fit in? Nah, don't think so! There is soemthing else that you have come to grips with and you are standing at the edge of making that final leap into the unknown and you choose to call it : complete liberation from all that is. Yes this is how my mind works more or less as I live day to day, like a guinea pig being put in a maze running around lost and scared often times but determined by the day to break free from all that is holding me down from discovering my true nature that which the Buddhas called; the Unborn Buddha Nature. 
So, why do I do it? Why do i fast during the fasting month of Ramadan every year? Good question but no good answers except that I feel it is the right thing to do as far as my spiritual practice goes.It is a very tough act of spiritual discipline not unlike sitting meditation or praying five times a day. In truth I have no answer t many of these questions and as i am abut to leave this realm of existence i am finding that they really of no relevance for my state of consciousness, my ultimate sense of Being-ness. If I have to answer for my transgressions in this life when I die so be it, but I hope in all fairness that I am given the same faculty and state of full consciousness when I face my inquisitors...Insha'Allah.

This is my favorite posture when I am faced with too much mental chatterings and external vexations. I feel safe as safe can be when I take my nap.



  

  

Ode toTwo close Friends Cecil and Ismail.

The collaboration works of poetry and black and white photos between Cecil Rajendra and the late Ismail Hashim entitled, "Scent of an Island," brought me back to the yester-years of Georgetown, the City the I grew up in during my childhood and younger days. This little jewel of a book depicting the works of two of Penang's great men of the arts is a memento given to me by the Author Cecil Rajendra through my daughter who was at a book reading event held at the E&O Hotel recently. 

I have made the acquaintance of both these gentlemen over the years and have a great admiration and respect for both in their lifestyle and accomplishments as creative individuals who had contributed in more than one way towards the artistic growth of the Georgetown community. Their works captures and reflects the City's bygone days of our childhood days as we are of about the same age. If the sense of smell could be added to the pictures and narratives, one could almost feel being lost in space and time. As we take a street by street tour with the poet we are transported into a era where a part of history has been etched in time that today is all but lost. Yes lost to what is deemed as development and progress that is haunting the Island's socio and economic landscaped. Through the eyes of the poet we are being shaken to wake up to the reality that is looming in our horizon of the decadence of our society as politics and money takes the front seat of our legislators and lawmakers.

" We move forward in time 

   backwards in sensitivity.

  these are days of condominiums and calculators.

Days when Brokers play

poker with our destiny.

In our rush to progress

we bulldoze our history...

we consign our best 

to the rubbish heap

of nostalgia and memory."  - Cecil Rajendra, "Scent of an Island."

We are drifting like Ships rudderless in the dark.

 In my last post I quoted from two different sources of spiritual belief and practices. The first was from a Satsang talk that was given by the Teacher Sunyamurti who has a Sangha or retreat somewhere in Costa Rica  while the second was from A Sufi Master who was from Turkey by the name of Ahmed Hulusi whom I was introduced to in the early 90s by my late friend and Teacher Cikgu Yusof Ali. Both these contemporary teachers holds my great respect fot their knowledge and understanding of their relative spiritual teachings. Sunyamurti was more inclined towards Hinduism and Buddhism and perhaps one would even consider him a universal teacher as his knowledge and wisdom encompasses just about every world religious as well as spiritual practices. Hulusi is more of an Islamic scholar who makes a great effort towards upgrading Islamic Faith and teachings to be better understood in the context of modern age. I find both these teachers to be well versed and fluid in delivering their respective teachings and what is more important to me is the fact that both their ways points towards the same destination; both points towards the unity and universality of human faith and spirituality.

On the surface Islam and Hinduism seems worlds apart and impossible to ever be made into a marriage of unity, the merging of differences seems impossible. However after years of studying and practicing each religion to the best of my ability and this including other religions such as Buddhism and Christianity as well as Taoism, I have found the common factor that binds them all together as One. This is the having the belief and faith in a a higher 'Power' or a Greater Source that all religions as well as spiritualists looks up to for assurance and refuge in times of dire need or even as a source of hope for salvation of the human spirit.; call Him/Her by whatever Name you will. It would take the utmost of an incorrigible egotistical mind to deny the existence of a Higher Being that man is answerable to no matter how enlightened he might feel he has become in the course of his lifetime. Man is his capacity as a human being alone is incapable of making sense of all that he experiences or is exposed to in the course of his life, he needs a teacher, a master, a creator to help him to chart out his routes for him of he be lost. Hence it is apparent that almost all the religious and spiritual faith that man is endowed with through out his-story has been the effort to make sense out of the non-sense that he finds himself in.

More than ever today, man needs to come to grips with his role in relationship to the rest of the world if not the universe itself. We need to realize without a doubt of our being, of who we truly are in relative to the rest of our fellow man if not humanity itself and our responsibility towards the care for our our environment, our home and all the sentient beings in it. Today more than ever we find ourselves taking a dump onto the very plate we are eating from and not even thinking twice about our actions. We have become very sick in body mind and soul and most of us are not even aware of how far or near we towards extinguishing our very existence at te single push of a button. We are most of us oblivious to the fact that we are on a death row and our execution date is looming up on the horizon. We have become like zombies straggling along like a herd of cattle headed for the slaughter house led and herded by those who hold the keys to our freedom through exploitation of our mass ignorance, our disbelief in a higher(collective) consciousness as we become veiled through our conditioned state of greed, hate and ignorance.  

In Hinduism we are said to be in the final stages of the Kali Yuga or the age of destruction and similarly in Islam it is said that the planet and all within it is head for the end of time of Khiaamah or as in Bahasa Malasia it is called akhir zaman the end of and so is said in ost other religions such as Christianity and its End of Days and so forth. Much as I would like to debunk these religious perceptions I cannot help but begin to see the manifestations of signs that would usher in these Doomsday revelations and yes I do feel like we are running seriously out of time. The question is is there hope for humanity to ever change its destructive course and embark upon a more positive and humane path that we are created for by the Creator. What would it take for us to wake up from this dream state we are in that headed towards a nightmare that we might never wake up from? Stop saying to ourselves that we are only human or that it is fated or that it is  our destiny; I do not buy that not even from God. 

                    

The First Day of Ramadan. 2021 - COVID Fasting.

 Upadesha saram the essence of the teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi; The Great Yogi, the Maha Yogi is the one whose mind is extinguished, the mind is withdrawn from external objects, completely. The mind that is to be extinguished is the belief that there is an I. When thoroughly investigated the I does not exist Where the thought vanish there appears, by itself the 'I am I', this is Purnam, the infinite,the fullness the absolute. It means I am not the body, nor the mind but the absolute I that cannot be defined except as I and has no other. Does not exist in a world of objects or duality of any kind, that total realization of the self. That is nothing and yet because it's nothing it is also everything but there is no-thing because there is only awareness but that awareness is the absolute and there will be no doubt of it because that sense of I am I  comes with the realization of Sat Chit Ananda the Bliss of luminosity of completeness of perfection. This is who you are... this is always the true import of the term I...as there is no second being to know that which is, that which is is consciousness, we are that. Extinguish the illusion of the ego by creating a mind that is at peace.and that peace will bring clarity and meaning real meaning that I am I and action, action that comes from that perfect consciousness. 

Sunyamurti Satsang on the Eassence of Shri Ramana Maharshi's teachings.

 "Those mind travellers taking this spiritual journey and trying to comprehend this fact will eventually begin to consider themselves to be the only Reality (Haqq). What’s more is that they are plunged into the vortex of unity that they would eventually say ‘I’m God, I do whatever I want and everything is permissible (Mubah) for me’. This is also known as the stage of the Inspired Self, whereby the consciousness receives direct instructions through inspirations concerning its own truth or becomes attached to the whirlpool of the ‘Inspired Self’... If, however, the spiritual wayfarer seeking this fulfilment cannot achieve this realization and ascend to the stage of complete Tranquillity (Mutmainna), then the awareness of Commanding Self (Ammara) takes control of him. After a little while, he begins to feel himself like a Pharaoh endowed with the knowledge of Mulhima (the stage of the Inspired Self), so therefore, he would consider everything as false while he assumes himself as a perfect being with no faults whatsoever. As a result, he would depart the world in such a spiritual state of mind!...

Unless you know the truth of your own self, it is impossible for you to realize the truth of your own Sustainer, because your own self is the veil that screens you from your Sustainer"

Ahmad Hulusi

Today begins the first day of the fasting month of Ramadan and Muslims all over the world will observe this month of abstinence and spiritual discipline. I wish all my brothers and sisters all over the Muslim world the Blessings of Allah in their observation of this Holy of Holy of the Musli month. We are all One at heart and in faith and no matter who or where we are our final destination is back to the One where our source originates and in this no matter how of what our life practice may be it is for us to honor and respect eah other's Ways towards what is Goodness, Love and Compassion for one another. We are each and every one of us a member of humanity and we abide by the same principle in life and that is to serve for the betterment of the specie we call homo sapiens. The rivers are many,but the ocean is One.

The Meaning implied by the name Allah. - Ahmad Hulusi

  It is very well known that according to those who are interested in Sufism, there are four main dimensional realms,(Alam). These are the Universe of Essence, (Alam Al Zat), the Universe of Attributes, (Alam Al Sifat), the Universe of Names,(Alam Al Asma') and the Universe of Actions, (Alam Al Afaal). By realizing the Supreme Truth permeating these Universes a person can certainly liberate him/herself from all suspicions and hence attain ultimate realization through spiritual ascendance (Uruj) and this in return would allow him to know his Truth,(Haqiqat).

We know that the noun 'Allah' is written bu using the Arabic letter starting with the letter ' Alif' which stands single at the beginning while at the same time being free from all the other letters that follows it. Next to the letter 'Alif' are two other letters , the letters 'Lam', which are both connected to each other. The second of these is followed by the letter 'H'. Although it is not visible, there is also another letter, 'Alif' which is invisible between the two last letters. When recited it can function like a short vowel giving the sound of the letter 'A'. ...the first 'Alif' corresponds to the stage of primary'Oneness',(Ahaddiyyat), which signifies the quality of the the One, in other words, the Essence, (Zat) of the one named Allah. The essence cannot be limited in any way whatsoever, or be grasped by any vision, because at the level of the Essence there is absolute freedom which indicates that the Essence is totally independent of all the attributes. In fact it is such a state of NON-EXISTENCE that it cannot be defined or imagine in any way or thought by any means whatsoever. This state is symbolized bythe letter 'Alif' which in exxence is a straight stroke extending vertically from a dot, by standing absolutely independent from all other letters in the writing of the word 'Allah'.

Let us now explain the meaning of the two letters that are tied together in the letter ‘Lam’. The first ‘Lam’ refers to the Universe of Attributes. This means that all that exists comes to life and becomes fully conscious through the qualities and the attributes of this particular dimension. In fact, all universes are made up with the unfoldment of the Divine Names, which is the outcome of the spiritual dimension pointing to the stage of attributes. This is the reason why the first ‘Lam’ or the letter ‘L’ is written adjacent to the second ‘Lam’ or the letter ‘L’ in the Arabic way of writing the word ‘Allah’. Let us now talk about the second ‘Lam’. As can be seen, the letter ‘L’ here is tied to the first ‘Lam’, which simply indicates that the entire existence is made up of the qualities that are inherent within the spiritual station of the Divine Attributes and they subsist in the utmost unity. The Divine Qualities that are present in the level of the Names take their origin from the station of the Divine Attributes. Because of this reason, the second ‘Lam’ can be considered as the repetition of the first one, appearing for the second time as is shown with this demonstrative pronoun. However, this time, it appears with a distinct feature since the meaning and the detail it conveys is not the same. Therefore, it can be said that the second ‘Lam’ takes its origin from the first one, so is not just regarded as a repetition of the first ‘Lam’, but points to a unique stage where innumerable revelations becomes manifest. Therefore, it has been repeated for the second time. Let us now focus our attention on the letter ‘H’. Whether it has been written as a circle figure tied to the second ‘Lam’, which is how it has been written for ages, or it appears in a squared shape as used in Qufi calligraphy in early days of Islam, the letter ‘H’ simply signifies the following. It represents the Universe of Actions exhibiting all the Divine Qualities, which has no beginning or an end; it is nothing other than continuous transformation emanating from the Universe of Attributes and Names. In other words, the letter refers to the myriad of universes in universes and everything that has been perceived in them! In Qufi calligraphy, the letter ‘H’ has two types of shapes. It has either two eyes or two dots on top. This shows that the Universe of Actions can be considered from two perspectives, either as a visible world or an invisible world, depending on the level of the observer and how it is being perceived. The letter ‘H’ is tied to the second ‘Lam’, because the Universe of Actions has no independent existence from the Universe of Names and the Universe of Attributes. What’s more is that the Universe of Actions exists with the qualities emanating from the dimension of Attributes and Names from which it is originated itself. Meanwhile, there is a hidden ‘Alif’ between the second ‘Lam’ and the letter ‘H’. However, its existence is pronounced every time it is being recited. This shows that the Universe of Actions exists with the Will of the Divine Essence, which is within the knowledge (ilm) of Allah Almighty and this continues without any interruption by subsisting in total unity through His Names and Attributes. There is no doubt that people who have attained this truth will certainly realize what we have communicated from the masters of spiritual discovery more comprehensively. This would not only enable them to evaluate what the name ‘Allah’ refers to in a better way, they would also notice why this name has been chosen as the most suitable name. I hope that the information we have presented above, which had already been acquired by many people through their spiritual self discoveries will help us to understand the delicacy of the name of ‘Allah’ in a better way, so that we can use this word in an appropriate manner in the future.

Mind is a drama queen! Yoy have to let it play itself out...

 Search for words all I can but never finding the right words  of how I feel sometimes sure and sometimes merely drifting. I feel the breath of my Lord touching me in my heart giving the will stay alive after yet another 'mild stroke' or as th doctor called it, hypertension attack and almost passed out totally from consciousness. Without going into the how and where, I did thought I was dying watching my last breath drift away from my body and I prayed to my Lord for forgiveness and surrendered my self. My daughter called on the phone and I was brought back to reality of the physical form of mind and body. I had to get up and drive home. I made it home with no difficulty fortunately and with no one to the wise as to what had happened to me a while before. Sometimes I feel like Mr. Sanford of Sanford and Son old black and white series in the US. Mr.  Sanford would clutch his chest and reach towards heaven for his wife calling for his late wife Elizabeth, "I am coming Elizabeth! This it, the Big One!" but it never came. Fred Sanford survived every major heart attack and with his son build a junkyard empire of Sanford and Son.

I found for me surrendering to the inevitable is the final act of worship; surrendering to the Will of the Lord, to His Infinite Mercy and Compassion has made it simpler to face my final big one as step by step, breath by breath I merge myself into the unknown, the final breath never came, not so far Insha'Allah, God willing. I am not pure enough to return to my Maker, still existing in limbo between this and that shore, drifting into senseless oblivion in purgatory, waiting to be reassign into the next round of life,death and rebirth.However this too is yet another illusion, perceptions of a deluded mind. There is nothing to be written about what is after death will there be life after death.How would it all play out and what of heaven and hell? Judgement Day and reward or retribution? Even the most pious of man carries the same thought in his mind regardless of how strong his or her faith is in the One True Source; our ego centric nature will not allow it to happen. To merge into the ocean of consciousness, like a river into the sea, is a suicide of the ego. To return to the formless, dreamless, state of the unconscious would be like embracing emptiness.Too deep to ponder for an average mind this spiritual concept of non duality, the merging of differences in unity. 

I feel it is getting harder and harder to end this postings that I have kept on doing for over a decade now and all in the name of self healing and soul searching, the quest to meet my true nature, who I truly am. I feel like the closin chapter is at hand and whatever I try to share feels unimportant, they seem like stories, mini series, episodes of a lifetime. It was started with good intentions, wanting to develop my writing skills for lack of better things to do and that was back sometime in 2005 when my close friend Fadzly Mubin in Kuala Terengganu set up my Blog for me. Yes i wanted to write, felt like writing to notes to myself might lead me somewhere on this road to find out and now I am stilll tapping away at the keyboard writing down my thoughts and feelings out in the open was fascinating too. thoughts, thus i have been writing. I started off with the attitude that i will write just the way I speak, nothing fancy and now i am writing about death and heaven and hell!  About Chilli source and soya source that source the binds it all! I do feel like a schizo sometimes trying to stay on track and in balance, its like walking the tight rope while carrying two bucket of crap hanging from across your shoulder. Any sudden shift and shit hits the fan!

There is not much left to say that is worthwhile except for the fact that I feel like the time is near for a major shift in my life, for better or for worse only the Lord knows. Truth be told I have become attached to making these postings and it has become yet another addiction, and there is nothing left t say that have not already been told, try reading my blog between the lines; what I have not written. I feel that I would only lead me into regression on my ongoing personal journey,  I am making my spiritual cleansing of the heart and soul in surrendering to That which Is, beyond form and timeless Divine nature of the Lord of the Universe, the Lord of Power, the Lord of Infinite Love and Compassion; how do i get to put down in words these thoughts that demands to be heard and shared by those that stumble upon these words by chance and pick a diamond in the rough out of a dung heap or two that could alter their lives for the better or worse. These notes to myself helps me to keep my sense of humor and my fingers alive that words may flow from my mind effortlessly so as to justify that i hae fulfilled my vow to share my journey with the world so that NETFLIX  can make a mini series out of it... like the Life and Times of the Cheeseburger Buddha.

Rambling on...

 More and more of humanity are awakening to the fact that the human specie is primarily ego driven and the demise of the ego is inevitable if the human race if not the Planet itself is to survive the next century. As is evident in the emergence of a greater sense of awareness among the well informed and educated masses especially the younger generation, getting to understand the workings of the mind and consciousness itself has grown in interest worldwide. If there be any hope at all for the human race to climb out of the quagmire that we are in it is through coming to terms with our own understanding. the very nature of our own being or consciousness. Throughout human history mankind has made it his quest to understand who he truly is and how connected is he to the rest of the world in all its shapes and forms. The effect he has on his fellow man, his community, his country and the rest f the universe,with or without his concent or even knowledge.  Religious belief and spiritual practices has been tailored from the dawn of civilization towards urging man to become aware of himself of strength and weaknesses, what he is capable of albeit in his creative or destructive nature. Detrimental to himself and in effect to the rest of the world man has chosen to turn his back upon the teachings of his forefathers resulting in what we have today, a civilization that is headed towards anarchy and self destruction; we are out to hang ourselves as a whole and we are going to take the Planet with us...perhaps meant to be, it is as it should be...karma sucks.

The ego has become the all mighty self perpetuating entity that dominates every aspect of existence in the form of greed, hate and ignorance. From the top to the bottom of the human conscious state the ego has taken man down the road towards confrontation and self serving attitude calling it survival of the fittest.From desiring to become the strongest, the richest, the most admired and adored to that of becoming Demigods, Deities and Demons.the ego has led man astray and many has met with despair resorting towards violence and corruption when these negative traits become overpowering if not fully met and confronted with; we call it aptly; the rat race. Yes we have become like rats racing in every direction scrounging for whatever there is. to stay on top and alive. Whether we are living in the sewer or in the villa in Dubai, we are scrounging for more and more it seems  as though enough is never enough as we hoard and cling on to what we have often oblivious towards the ideals of charity and sharing with those who are in need.

We who are concerned with the state of our environment, it flora and fauna, its health, we are not doing our best. We have neglected if not abused our environment as badly as we can read or watch it all on You Tube; Google and a host of other links on the Internet there is no denial to the fact that you have no excuse not to be aware. Many species of animals have become extinct in the last decade they say/ Our seas and oceans are slowly being depleted to the point of no return by illegal and unregulated fishing activities that is killing much more than the needed catch. We live in self denial and make believe attitude as far as the environmental issues are concern; we are the cancerous virus that our planet is being suffering from, e are destroying out host through our ignorance and arrogance, pride and prejudices, our misbegotten believe that we each and everyone of us exist as an individual, a person with a personality. We grew up with a conditioned sense of perception of who we truly are and how much a responsibility we have as who we are in the grand scale of human condition and evolution and existence itself. 

I realize I am sounding like a broken record to myself repeating all that passes trhough my mind time and again, trying to make sense out of what is non-sense, killig time while waiting for the next wave to come to take em into the unknown, that ' One Step Beyond', It is also a practice of keeping a watch on myself as I drift in and out of this realm  of Maya, the world of illusions, of impermanence and of decadence and death; life has been great but enough is enough. I keep regressing into the ego-mind scenarios of my being a 72 year old man who has spent a good amount of his time finding a cure for his wounded and corrupted soul. The healing process is this ongoing ramblings so as to keep some sort of a record of my progression or regression as i take more steps into the future or as i grow older. My only solace is in the faith that my Lord is oft. Forgiving and Merciful, a Lord of Love and Compassion. I hold this faith within th heart of my heart where my 'secret of secrets are held.' I have to love myself as much as I Love God and submit myself unto Him when I am fully drowned in my own self love. I am old and I am tired in more than one way for my journey has been log and winded one full of sinkholes and trap doors, I have fallen from grace in more tha one way and some in the big way that is beyond rationality. 

  .    

The Greater Jihad - The war Within.

When you listen to the ancient sound of the flute play in the wind with its tunes floating through the forest and valleys, don't you feel like you are Lord Krishna? With all the beautiful Gopis chasing after you and how you entertain them soothing their souls from the trappings of Mara the shadow. When asked the flute how it got to be so blessed that the Godhead blows His breath through its entire body and entertain this realm of Maya. The flute answered, "I am but a humble hollow reed and the Lord but blows his breath through me that He may entertain Himself while keeping an eye over existence itself." Life is a dance, a play, a performance with each and everyone of us has a role to play from our cradle to our grave, life is God's own masterpiece in His Creation, Life is God playing hide and seek with Himself, what else can God do being all by Himself; humanity is the Lord's killing fields and His garden of milk and honey, heaven and hell. Where I stand in the matter is that I am beginning to have a clear understanding of how far or how near I am to the truth, where what is real and what is unreal, what is eternal and what is with and ending, what is form and what is the formless in the true sense of the word understand is to my estimation. However,"The show must go on" as the lyric goes in one of Pink Floyd's songs,and for so long as I am breathing in and out this particular show will go on, in its own time and space; we each play our own roles and make a movie happen collectively.

More and more talks of the planet we are living in is sick and needs to be healed including it inhabitants especially humanity and more and like minded people are getting together the spiritual nature of this our spiritual growth sustainably alongside that of our material to have a strong check and balance over what is and what s not permissible in the code of humanity dictum. I feel we have to come completely out of our shell instead of just sneaking our necks out when it is safe out there; To pull our heads out of the sand and pay greater attention of what is going on around us, how we are self destructing ourselves along with the rest of this our home. We are self fulfilling creatures, mankind,we love the tragedy, we are proud of our history and make it into great movies.  we are a collective part of the whole scene, each doing our own thing, minding our own business and and we live or call it living our days out making a mark here and there and call it a legacy; tragedy is our most favorite and common theme that we as humans like to write about, brag about, sing about, tell our grandchildren about; where was I during the Second World War? or where was I on the day 13th.of May 1969? Where were you living during the COVID19 pandemic? 

The Prophet of Allah, (pbu), is said to have said that mankind has to fight two wars and this second war is his greater Jihad, the Jihad against your own Nafs or ego, your shadow, your darker nature your anger, your pain, your sorrows will all be used against you by your ego; the ego will not and cannot be removed quite as easily as it is an entity that I myself has created over the years or throughout my life. Th ego is who I think myself into being who I am, believing that I am this physical form and that this dual thinking mind is who I am;  Someone said once that to be a great artist or at anything for that matter a small amount of egocentric is needed. One who without an ego is one that is walking this earth in limbo, between heaven and hell, light and darkness, sky and earth, That there may be saints or even Prophets, the perfect man, AlInsan Kamil, is one in a few thousand years, perhaps in the next Yuga when the age of our evolution as a specie on this Planet or in this realm and dimension will take a turn for better or worse; we have to fall upon the spiritual teachings of the ages and find a common ground we all can stand on as a collective force in spirit. A very rare and purified diamond, a splinter of light that has been purified in hell's flames; an egoless man was the Buddha, Shakyamuni Gautama , the Historical Buddha; After countless eons legend has it that the  Buddha incarnated for the final round of experiencing life as a human being and find out the truth about the nature of life, death and rebirth; Why? This is the question that confronts the ego asks ultimately and will not cease to pursue for a truth that can explain where we stand as human beings on this Planet, or even if we deserve to be here after all the waste we have created in our wake...our human experience.

#lordkrishna,#buddhashakyamuni,#thegreaterjihad,#covid10

 

What is meditation in Action.

 The call to do some form of proper practice in meditation came to me one day in the print making studio at UWGB where the print making club members were busy polishing plate, keep watchful eyes on the acid bath, drawing fine likes on the copper plates.... I was standing bside an elderly member of the group a Mrs. Rossela Kelly, perhaps in her late sixties , we were both busy polishing our copper plates and she elbowed me and said out of the blue, Sam, I think it time for you to make a change!" Yes I believe so, Madame!" I replied without hesitation. My son, Dennis is being ordained a Zen Monk in New York and is planning on opening his own Center, why don't you go and join him." Two weeks or so later I was in Sausalito. San Francisco Bay Area helping Dennis to open his ZenYoga Center at Corte Madeira, Marin County, Ca. I can say that Dennis was my first Zen Instructor, friend and spiritual elder Brother. Despite what happened later in our relationship, I still hold him to be one of the best gift as a Guru, I could not ask for a better 'Nutcase', to crack my consciousness wide open when I needed it most. Dennis Junpo Kelly went on to become an abbot of his own Zen school, The Hollow Bones Zen. To me Dennis is one of those westerners worthy to wear the robes of a Rinzai Zen Master and teach the Way of Zen in the Rinzai Tradition.

Although for a very short time, I was initiated and became a member of the Zen community of the SF Bay Area by Dennis who coached me in the meditation as well as the 'Guirilla Yoga' techniques Ashtanga Yoga; Dennis was a student of B.K.S Iyengar. One can easily Google for more detailed information on this and will undoubtedly prove a useful knowledge. Dennis was at the time a very impressively built handsome man and commanded respect from all his peers. Having spent three years castrated at the San Quentin Federal Penitentary for drug related issues, upon his release chose the spiritual path which took him to India and Sri Lanka where he studied Yoga and meditation practices. He was a true self made man who took on life grabbing the bull by its horns and I was awed and inspired by his presence. 

One day while about to enter the Green Gulch Farm Zen Center Dennis turned to me and shouted out of the blue, "Bahari San! What is an imperturbable mind?" I was given my first Zen Koan to work with whether it was intentional or not and the question was imprinted into my consciousness till today. Whenever I thought of my first Zen Teacher these words comes into my mind and I would meditate on it as a subject to ponder upon and it has seen me through many a circumstances late in my life. Although we parted ways in the worse possible ways one can imagine, I still hold a high regard for my teacher and friend, who took me under his wings and set me on a course towards my own self liberation. He may not forgive me for what had transpired between us that involved his teacher, Eido Shimano Roshi, the only regret  I have is that I had lost a great opportunity to transcend my self deluded egocentric nature possibly if I had I stuck with Dennis in his quest to propagate Rinzai Zen in America...that is another story; but the Dharma works in mysterious ways too.

 It was at green Gulch Farm Zen Community that  was able to do my time as a Zen student for almost two years straight. It was there that I learned to sit and to listen, to heal and become in tune with others who had similar karmic debts like  did to work out. It was at Green Gulch that I discovered my unbounded Buddha Nature, my strength and weaknesses. It was here that I was able to pull myself out of the rut that I was in prior to my life in San Francisco; I owed the Zen community back then my life and forever am indebted to the Teachers and fellow students who I had the opportunity to work with. My gratitude goes out to my Teacher Paul Disco and Blanch Hartman, Ed Brown and several fellow brothers and sisters in the Zen community who were able to accept me despite the fact that I was incorrigible to begin with. Among these practitioners I learned about who I am and where my destiny lies; Gasho! 

"Meditation, if it is real, is an act of Love, of becoming Love, of the commitment to Be Love and to renounce the desire for Love and the objects upon which we project our Love and to make us proxies and substitutes for Love. We must accept no substitute...The first step in meditation is to become free from belief.

" - Sunyamurti Teaching @ Sat Yoga Ashram.

#greengulchzencommunity, #sunyamurtiteaching,#iyengaryoga,#rinzaizen,#satyogaashram, #meditation

  

    

Meditate on this...

 My trip to Alaska was accompanied by two worthwhile books to read along the way, one was called," at the Foothills of Georgia" or something like that by G.I.Gurdgief.  and the other was called the "Raja Yoga" by Swami Vivekananda. How I came by these is  another story,By this time I was steep into pursuing all there was to know about meditation, spirituality, religions and the inner workings of my being. I had just graduated from the University of Wisconsin at Gtreen Bay, (UWGB) and with no sense of what to do with myself on a whim decided to take a challenge to head out for Alaska on a one way ticket. I had by then been acquainted with the works of J. Krishnamurti and Alan Watts, the works of Philip Kapleau and Baba Ram Dass, I read Paramahamsa Yogananda and D.T. Suzuki and G.I. Gurdjief among others while working at the University library and so I was well on my way towards having some sense of what I was getting into as far as my spiritual quest was concern. Hence I made my meditation practice as the safety blanket that i carried around with me while embarking into the unknown territories of the West and  Alaska. By then, being in a state of meditation came naturally to me and I often drift away from the crowd to find a quiet spot to sit back and recoup. A small stream in the woods in Tenaway Valley in Cle Alum, Washington State, or a roadside rest area along the highway to Butte, Montana. I often found the peace and comfort within me after sitting quietly by myself and what was more important  was the ability to face all the trials and tribulations that laid before me on this arduous journey and as a matter of fact I often looked forward to what was in store for me instead of being afraid.

I was often asked if I was not scared of getting hurt or killed, being lost or too poor to keep myself alive while on my journey and my answer was always the same, I had given myself up to my Lord and whatever happen to me for better or worse was His doing and I accepting. The only fear I had was not fulfilling my unwritten destiny which often led me to go through life unplanned and often chaotic. My one big salvation was my faith was in the All Mighty to whom I had once in my teenage years out of sheer despair pointed my middle finger up at Him and screamed. F..k You! in the middle of night. It was after this sacrilegious act of defiance that I had let myself go and became short of demonic in my take on life. I knew back then that i was destined to roam the earth a sinner like, "The Wandering Jew". curse by Christ to live forever,never to taste death. When I left my home and country I felt like i was  self exiled, castrated from my own kind and vowed never to look back no matter the consequences and so I kept burning the bridges behind me and this exactly was my state of mind when I left Green Bay. Wisconsin for Sandpoint, Alaska and along with some cash I had managed to beg and scrounge around were the two books that I had on me: I was in my early thirties.

Being on the road, living life from the fringe, I finally began to realize was my meditation practice; I was like a suniasin a sadhu, a mendicant monk travelling from one point to another simply because it was what i had to do in order to stay sane if not attain to some form of spirituality for my wounded soul. The only difference being I set upon a journey on the dark side of my nature, I was an angry man most of my young adult life that had cost me my marriage and ending up loosing my only son back when. I took my anger upon all that I come into contact with, I began to start healing myself through all the different spiritual techniques that would help to become aware of who I truly am. For better or worse I'm waking up from the unreal into the lightness of the real. The anger and sorrow I felt all these years are what created the image that I came to believe of who I am suppose to be. Bit by bit , breath by breath I will keep on peeling away the layers of veils that is around me untill I find the source from where it all began; what greater challenge is there to give oneself while in this human form?

Meditate on This...  

#meditation # G.I.Gurdjief # sandpointalaska #greenbaywisconsin #yoganandaswami #alanwatts #d.t.suzuki

Let's get serious on meditation...part one.

     It takes sometime for the chattering mind to become silent, however it is not impossible and imperative that one be able to silence the incessantly busy mind before the actual or proper state of meditation can happen. This is purely my personal view from my own practice of Zazen or sitting meditation in the Soto Zen tradition of the Zen Patriarch  Dogen Zenji.

Dōgen Zenji, also known as Dōgen Kigen, Eihei Dōgen, Kōso Jōyō Daishi, or Busshō Dentō Kokushi, was a Japanese Buddhist priest, writer, poet, philosopher, and founder of the Sōtō school of Zen in Japan. Wikipedia

Although it is almost impossible to rid the mind of its habitual tendency to chatter, ramble and indulge it all manner of mental formation, it is of utmost importance that one find the space where the mind is silent and be able to observe whatever arise from this quiet space. it is like trying to fall asleep but not wanting to drop off into the sleep state instead to awaken to the fully awaken state of consciousness. What does one hope to achieve from this simple practice is relative to each individual and their own personal understanding. I personally have sought to find the peace and tranquility from my ever so busy and often negative and destructive  egoic mind. I suffer from having an egotistical mental state that has been the cause of many of my faults and failures in life. I also seek to find ways and means to have a good handle on my anger and my fear issues, my low self esteem and my lack of faith in the Divinity of my own being.

My introduction to meditation happened when I was fourteen when my father who was formerly a Buddhist from Sri Lanka before he married my mother and was converted to Islam, saw me sitting in a Yoga posture and told me to study Yoga and practice meditating. I took his advice and sat facing the South China Sea every chance I had staring at the horizon from the beach of the East Coast state of Terengganu. Later at the age of sixteen I joined the Malay martial arts of Silat Seni Gayung and was further encouraged to develop my sense of 'inner engineering' to develop a spiritual capacity for getting in touch with spirit guides that the art features. The art of ''Menurun" or "Peturun', was a form of spiritual trance that one gets into and be possessed by spirit guides or what we used to call spiritual buddies in the martial art. It was inadvertently a part of the martial arts practice to be able to bring the mind into a focus or quiet state to allow for the inner or subconscious being to manifest itself in every moves made while in combat.  In its purest form this state of mindless consciousness was developed and practiced by the Japanese Samurai warrior when using the Katana.

As a teenager growing up along the East Coast I was also very much into free diving in and around the islands off the coast collecting exotic sea shells a a hobby. Diving under water for a long period of time without using any Scuba equipment can be an awakening experience as one becomes lost in time and the mind forget that it was not breathing due to being attracted by the beauty of the corals and exotic fishes one can be lost in what divers called oxygen narcosis, or something to that effect. Although it is not as serious when free diving but one can still feel the change in ones state of mind like becoming intoxicated or high underwater. While in this state I found the mind the mind to be very quiet and deeply focused upon what was around me which was one of the reasons I loved free diving. I wouls tempt fate by hovering like an eagle just above a coral bed and lost myself in time just watching the corals and fishes around me. This was how I felt about beeing in a deep meditative state of consciousness where time and space is lost and only a state of being is present.

Yet later on in my life when I moved to Green Bay, Wisconsin and was exposed to the Wisconsin winter my state of consciousness took a new heightened state as the stark whiteness and the silence of the snow covered landscape posited my mind on deep freeze. Meditating in the cold snow covered landscape or sitting before a warm fireplace during the winter months took my meditation practice to a higher or deeper level as by now I found the literature and studies done on meditation from the University library at UWGB. The sense of awesomeness, of pure silence and stark whiteness and freezing cold that chills your bones of the winter landscape of Wisconsin was like being in a state of hibernation of body and mind. Sometimes I can be found sitting on a rock facing Lake Michigan stretching like a white field into the horizon where it was hard to tell where the sky meets the earth. Sometimes you can find me sitting at my window of the old farm house on Humboldt Road gazing at the stretch of corn field as far as the yes can see like a sea of undulating endless green in summer. When the colors of autumn leaves comes along I would find myself absorbed, mesmerized by the sea of colors that stretches from one end to the other as I stood viewing the fall leaves from the top of the Ski Ramp at Iron Mountain , Michigan, where my landlord, Leon P. Lodl and I would make a trip every weekend to work on an old church he had bought and was converting it to a ski lodge.

#zazenmeditation,#greenbaywisconsin,#uwgb,#ironmountainmichigan,#southchinasea,#dogenzenji

to be contd.

  

The Buddha goes Live .

   As the Lunar calendar of the Chinese New Year approaches I feel like my time has arrived to tear myself through the China house and shatter this illusion called 'My life' as the final act of defiance as an Ox born; I am going live on You Tube to tell my story. Yes I am evolving from my sketch book journals to my Blogging and now to videos exposing the lives and times of the Cheeseburger Buddha; the stubborn old fool who refuses to give up and fade away quietly into the night. No Sir, this bull of an ox has still got some steam left to kick up a storm among those whose minds are open and genuine enough to share the journey of one who has lived life according to his own rhythm and blues. The journey of self discovery, a journey set about since 1978 when I first decided to keep an ongoing journal/sketch book upon making a trip to England. My first journal after all these years is still with me to remind of my resolution to keep an ongoing journal of my life as an artist, a father, a husband, and the rest.

Telling it as it is with no holds barred except whne what i reveal might incriminate myself or harm others in any way, I will be as honest as I possibly can to share the truth of what it has been like and what it was all meant to be; my life, the quest to realize who I truly am beyond name and form. To share my strength and weaknesses, pleasures and sorrows, my spiritual growth and my decadence of spirit; how far or how near am I towards my self liberation from the cycle of life and death and rebirth as the Buddha had revealed. This has been a journey of self healing. a journey of unveiling of the broken or splintered spirit since the day I was born, an unwanted child given up for adoption and raised for twelve years of my child hood as a Buddhist in a Muslim household and community. This is my story, a story of pain and anger, shame and guilt growing up living on the periphery of life for fear of being abused and ridiculed; how I became a demon in my early years, I grew in to an adult life a very angry entity with a very low self esteem and destructive nature.

Try as hard as I could I still have problem discarding my deep rooted karmic past, my anger and psycho-emotional baggage have become so much a apart of me that I sometimes thought of ending my life prematurely which I attempted on two separate occasions in the past. These are my stories to be unveiled as they arise or if and when they arise accordingly as this is how my mind function or so I have observed over the years. I also realize that these episodes and dramas of my past experiences will continue on to haunt me until I can uproot them completely through self revelation or in short an open confession not before a priest or a psychiatrist but before humanity itself.

Having been converted to Islam at the age of twelve when I was returned to my parents to be raised as such on the the East Coast state of Terengganu, I accepted God as Allah and when I call out to Him in my darkest hours I always call out Ya Allah, Ya Rab, and my only prayer to Him is and has always been Astarghfirrullah al GhafurruRahim. I only sk for His mercy and Forgiveness as I know fully well what a sinner i have been throughout my life. However having been raised a Buddhist for twelve of my childhood years has an impact upon my faith and practice throughout my life and this have been one critical aspect of my lifelong journey, an issue I have been trying to bring to a conciliation and conclusion. 

Thus as stubborn as my nature is I shall keep on plodding towards understanding the whole nature of my existence or what makes me who I am. I put no blame upon others no matter what the circumstances mat be nor do I apologize for what I have committed as this is my journey and mine alone towards the seat of the Lord of Power to Whom I will answer all my transgressions as I present my final analysis, a final portfolio of this journey. But for the Love and grace of my Lord I would have definitely ended in an insane asylum or ended my own life prematurely for I had on any occasions stood on the precipice and stared into the emptiness before me with  a sense of loneliness and despair, often my journals and writings has been there as reminders for me of why I am who I am, my purpose if not responsibility of being on this life's highway.

"Beings are numberless, I vow to awaken with them.

Delusions are inexhaustible, I vow to end them.

The Dharma Gates are boundless, I vow to enter them.

The Buddha's Way is unsurpassed I vow attain it."

Insha'Allah.

Fear - a poem by Khalil Gibran

It is said that before entering the sea
a river trembles with fear.

She looks back at the path she has traveled,
from the peaks of the mountains,
the long winding road crossing forests and villages.

And in front of her,
she sees an ocean so vast,
that to enter
there seems nothing more than to disappear forever.

But there is no other way.
The river can not go back.

Nobody can go back.
To go back is impossible in existence.

The river needs to take the risk
of entering the ocean
because only then will fear disappear,
because that’s where the river will know
it’s not about disappearing into the ocean,
but of becoming the ocean.