pain, pain, pain

It's been one month since I came back from Rishikesh. People keep connecting to the blog, which is something that I don't quite understand, anyway if I have just one reader I have a debt, and I must keep on writing. Really, just one reader means you are responsible.

I could have written in India, there's Internet over there. Not afterwards, since I've been so busy. Seems I'm not so responsible.

What happenned in my yoga course? I felt pain. Pain, pain pain. Some people get surprised, they expect yoga to be very different, they expect that I would enjoy it and feel calm. But it depends on your body, for some people the streching is enjoyable, for the stiff bodies it's mostly about pain. Why sould I keep on doing it, then? After 80-something posts during more than 3 years in this blog, did I manage to explain it yet? I hate that saying which goes something like "no pain no gain", anyway.

I stayed in Rishikesh the complete month of my trip to India, even if the yoga pain was growing. I was attending the classes and writing, and meeting very nice students at the course. Just for a couple of days I went to the mountains with the teacher (he goes once a month to relax, and invites a few people to go with him): knowing him was interesting and at the same surprising.

When he practices on his own he is perfection. He may go to a posture for 20 min with no effort, while for anybody normal it would very difficult to keep the same position for a few minutes and keep calm at the same time. He knows controls his body in an amazing way.

But...

Maybe it's me, I'm very naive many times, but I was expecting he would be a very different kind of person, very humble and with no ego. I was surprised to see he is so arrogant, and fussy, and he always goes around with a servant. I guess it is indian mentality also, the locals were treating him as a god.

And he talked so much, sooo much. Sometimes plesant, like a grandfather. But other times I got a headache; pain, once again, everything is around pain.

back to Rishikesh

In one week I'm having holidays and I'll go to India for one month; my plan is to go back to Rishikesh to a certain yoga teacher, wake up at sunrise and go to class and then for a swim at the Ganges, and spend the rest of the day writing.

Somebody told me yesterday: "ah, very well! you're back to sacred land and sacred water".

Just to be mean I told her that India is also the land of religious conflict, hindus and muslims don't live quite at ease. I started talking about a muslim friend and she showed her annoyance, until I mentioned by chance that my friend had been studying once with a sufi master, then she was delighted. Why? Just because sufi are meant to be mystics? Is it because they tend to speak about understandable matters, e.g. the essence of being?

For a lot of people here in the West, it seems that the more unbelievable it is, the more trustworthy it becomes. It happens with therapies for example, let's take Reiki distance healing: it's enough to appeal for a certain vague energetic concept. (A reasoning more of less like this, "if there is everything in the universe is energy, why is is you cannot believe that somebody may channel that energy at a distance??").

She was taking me in the car and we were looking for a parking place and then she said: "if we desire it humbly and sincerely, we will find one very quickly". And then around the corner there was a free place. She didn't say anything, didn't mention any energetic implications, neither did I.

Why, again? The more unexplainable, the best proven.

Assuming that most those writers claiming they have had mystics experiences really have had them, they are talking about something completely subjective we should not understand at all. Why is it we swallow it so easily and start talking about it? Why is it movies like "Star Wars" or "The Matrix" are not only deep and philosophical but also so "energetic"?

I'm sorry for my bad mood this morning. It must be I urgently need my holidays. One week to go!

(pd- By the way, I honestly believe there is a lot you do in the way to face up to life that changes reality, however I've never weighted if it had any effects on free parking places.)

some writers should not write

There's Internet and everybody may write in here and say whatever they feel like, no need to apologize afterwards. That's me, for example. For these, for us, it's not so important if there's anything really to say, and if there is, it does not quite matter if it is understood. It's better when it is, of course, but not mandatory.

Now imagine there's a writer who has something to say, whose knowledge could be essential for somebody else. This writer could be a philosopher, for example, who has been thinking about a subject for so long (for his whole life he's been a thinker), who writes a book and publishes it, and gets it translated, since abroad they've also figured he's saying something crucial... but then, who buys it?, and whomever does buy it and tries to read it, finds out it's so dense and difficult that it is quite impossible to understand. And the message gets lost, even if the writer was a sage.

For example I'm thinking about Sloterdijk, (whom I've quoted here sometimes). Would it be better if the good man, instead of writing the book himself, gets in touch with a novelist, let's say with three of them, and the four spend a month together talking, so that the thinker makes sure the others have understood, and only then the others write the book. Maybe the few scholars that used to read the original would be displeased, but what about the rest.

The other day I went to a lecture called "happiness and philosophy". It was great, however while I was listening I said to myself, why do I have the feeling they're explaining the usual, only with different words? And on my way back at the tube I kept wondering and wondering and finally this is the best conclusion I've got: it is me, who is actually hearing always the same. I only hear what I know already.

Probably that's my problem with Sloterdijk: there's no way to put his words into ideas I already know. I can only guess he's saying basically the same as the others, but I cannot be certain. And it is so distressing not to know.

first communion

Back to my hometown for the first holy communion of my nephew. Yesterday I went to my sisters' place to say hi, he asked me I had any present for him, I reminded him I had already sent some money which was used I was told as a contribution to buy a laptop, and he remembered, he actually knew the exact amount I had given, and showed me in. While the computer was starting up, he made a demonstration of a new karate stroke he had learned, shouting "that's the way christians defend ourselves!"

It took me quite some time to understand who was he referring to; christians of course are we. I did not answer with the retort that came to my mind, nor I tried to provoke him; he had just been to confession and he's supposed to stay clean of bad deeds until tomorrow, so that he may take the host. His mum showed me a photo album they had made, the images of the dressed-up child in such contrived postures that will surely make him blunt when he is grownup. I told my sister she could even consider using them as a blackmailing, "if you don't do as I say I will show around the pictures of your first communion!"

When I did it, myself I was not very happy. I had managed to skip the whole catechesis and only the very last day I went to the priest; he was quite upset with me but at least I was there for the rehearsal, in which we practiced how to go from the corridor to behind the altar and back, all the time forming nice queues ordered by our heights. Height ordering was very important for some reason. The day after, the big day of the performance, I made a mistake and broke the height line, and the priest was so angry. Anyway, I never saw him again.

I asked my sister; height arrangement seems to be still important nowadays. The priest of my nephew had apologized in advance, since he had started the rehearsals one month before and it could be that in the meantime some of the kids had shot up and the height order would not be respected anymore.

For the rest, there are differences as well: they've prepared quite a party after the event, like small scale wedding, including lunch for the family and the friends of the nephew, around 15; even worse, explains my sister, the nephew has been invited to around 15 communions of his friends, and has to bring up a present at each of them, besides everything happens in around one month and thus there are some he cannot assist to because of overlapping.

My mum has been this morning in the garden pickup up some rose petals, and since there were not enough rosebushes, some other flowers as well. Tomorrow first thing is to lay them at the outside of the house for my nephew so that he steps on them when he comes out to join a kind of procession which goes from the town hall to a chapel at the outskirts of the village, and then back to the big church. This is a sort of tradition at the place where my sister lives. Also, a band follows and plays grandiose music.


I don't know if I have to carry on, I hope I have made my point already.


(By the way, I'm relieved: it's been around two months from my last post and the weekly number of visits is slowly going to zero. Very slowly, though, still makes me wonder about the way Internet works.)

people and numbers

It's been about a month I haven't posted anything. It seems, according to a meter I included in the blog, during this time I've received around 10 visits a week, from quite different countries: Norway, Spain, USA, France, Malasya, India and Indonesia in the last 20 visits. I guess I don't know most of these readers, since I haven't even been in half of the countries of the list. On the other hand, I know there's a few people (2 or 3) who read itquite regularly. So I wonder.

I wonder why, assuming those visits happen "at random", from people just surfing around, why it is 10 visits a week, on quite a repetitive average, and not 2, or 350. Why not 1 this week and 20 next week.

And it's been 10 a week for months. It got to maybe 15 a week if I added posts more often: 10 seems to be the bottom even if I don't write (even if the blog was empty?)


I've put similar questions to myself about sports, in the past. Take for instance the 100m race: why the top runners are so closed, say from 9.7 to 10 seconds for the 8 people who take part in the final? Why only 8 people in the world go below 10? And those 8, how is it they are so regular? If one of them runs at 9.8, they usually do it at 9.8, not one month at 10.2 and the other in record time and the next at 10.5.

It's not the same in longer races, but there's strategy in these, it is not just "do it as fast as you can". Even so, it's possible to find regular patterns. For sure is quite similar in ski and swimming for instance. And I wonder why.


There's democracy also. In Spain, the biggest two parties get around 38% of the votes every election. One of them wins for there are small differences for reasons which are not easy to guess (at least most of the times). And it is like that in many other countries. In the US there are only two parties and their support is amazingly closed to 50%. This year Obama won "overwhelmingly" by a global difference of 3%. Democracy in the US is a very mature one, the Spanish one at its side looks like a babyboy. Besides, in most countries, the turnaround is just above 50%.

I guess in a perfect decision system half of the people decide to participate, and if there are 2 valid options, half of them go for each. I'm able to understand that (not that I necessarily think it's good).


Anyway, in this world, with so many people, there seems to be a big rule: probability. Call it luck. That's the reason why anything happens? That's why I don't get fired, or somebody else does, that's why I didn't get married and somebody else did???


And, what are we doing (and we call ourselves seekers) when we look for an explanation? Is there a chance we will understand? I wonder.

the victim under control

An old friend of mine was the victim of an impressive accident when he was riding a moped bike: he was overtaking a big trunk on the right, the trunk did a weird move and my friend fell and got caught by the back wheel of the trunk, and both the moped and himself were dragged on the road for around 15 meters.

On the floor, he was so stuck he could not get out by himself, even if the bike was not so heavy. People around were in doubt to move him because he had lost his helmet; he wanted to should at them to take him out, but he was in bad pain and he could hardly speak. Eventually they released him and while the ambulance was coming he was looking at his leg and wildly wondering if he would be able to move it again.

He would have killed the lorrydriver at that moment, "it was such a big trunk in a not so wide street!, what was he doing there?, and what was the effing manouver he did?"; some days later, the driver went to the hospital to visit and they made peace, although my friend did not like the guy, "not somebody I would get drunk with!". Actually the driver was a member of his club, he had joined that same year, when they had promoted to the spanish 'second B' category. But the diver had not had the chance to watch my friend playing. And he would not anymore.

The recovery was long and painful, the full thing took around a year, and my friend was 17 years old. He wanted to brake the plaster into pieces and start exercising the leg, and afterwards wanted to start walking, then running, and climbing mountains. However there were many things he would not be able to do anymore. "What if the accident had not happened?", he would say, "how far would I have gone in playing football?"

He didnt like studying, or arts; however nobody was going to stop him from getting whatever he wanted to.

And now, so many years later, he puts the icing on the cake of his life with his appointment as the president of his football club, the one he used to play for.



Propositions:
- my friend was overtaking a big trunk on the right in a street which was "not so wide"
- the lorrydriver was "somebody he would not get drunk with"
- when he was 16 years old, he was playing for a 3rd category football team
- the team promoted to "2nd B" and he would not play so often anymore
- ...


My friend is a prick, and the story is silly. Does the victim take control? Does he get anything he wants? And does it mean he is under control? What is "under control"? Is it a feeling, an opinion?

do it now!

There's many people seeking. Some of them struggle to learn how to stand on their heads, or to sit straight and crossed-legged. Others just put on fancy clothes and talk a lot, but most are genuine, why would they not be? And not all of them base themselves on eastern philosophies.

Anyhow, probably all of them would agree in one thing: they are in the process of learning, of improving, of making themselves better so that someday they will obtain what they are looking for. But, why does it have to be in the future, why not now?


As an example, I'll take something completelly unrelated: world hunger. Everybody is more or less concerned about that huge problem. Myself, I give away some money every year to some organizations which are supposed to do something about the subject. Little money it is. And I think about it from time to time, although is not the first thought that crosses my mind every morning.

I guess some people are less concerned, donate no money, they woud think it is not fair that people are starving, but realisticly they've figured there's not much to do about it.

On the other hand, there's a few who devote themselves and their lifes to the problem; what about those? Do those think the solution is at their reach? Probably not, more the contrary. But they don't get depressed, they just try to do everything they can to make a small contribution, to help the people of the area wherever it is they've travelled to. And it is awesome.


It is not only they are morally superior (they are, to me); also they look at a huge problem with no visible solution and they decide they want to do everything they can and they do it now.


From J Krishnamurti:
"Do you actually need time to be free of greed? I am taking that as an example [...] You are used to think you do. When I say I will get over it, that will is time [...] So the mind has become accostumed to the idea of psychological time -tomorrow, or many tomorrows."

And many many paragraphs later, after he brilliantly dismantles the idea of psychological time,
"So where we are? Where are you with regard to what you have heard, what you have learned, what you have seen for yourself? It is just mere words for you to carry? Or is there a deep fundamental change so that you are free of all your problems, free of fear? [...]"
Which applies not only to his lecture, but to everything you have heard, you have learned, you have seen for yourself.

Let's forget for a moment about world hunger and about a world free of greed -no matter I have not done anything about those. Am I just carrying words? Have I done anything?

endarkenment

I was 20 when it happenned, and it was sudden: I got endarkened and I ceased to believe.

It was sudden, but it was the conclusion of a slow process as well. My endarkement came out of the blue one morning when I realised I was living in a big contradiction: none of the stories I had been told about god made sense to me anymore, and at the same time I was relying on them at least to lay the foundations of my answers to some old big questions. But it was also slow, since it started even before my first holy communion; I managed to skip all the catechesis sessions and I went to the priest just one week before the event -he was very upset with me, however he explained me the details on the staging with the rest of the guys (how we should go in a queue to the altar and back, doing as if we were praying).

At the same time I was really a devotee: whenever I got a host into my mouth I used to talk to Jesus as a sincere believer, honestly. My problem came with the church itself, quite deceitful, and my catholic school and teachers, the boring religious studyings, and so on.


There were clear signs of the dark coming:
- Questioning the people who brought up the story to me (the teachers and the priests), not relying on their coherence, integrity or even their common sense
- Calling into doubt the aspects that sound unbelievable or unacceptable (weird explanations on the origin of life, old-fashioned moral doctrines)


Afterwards, getting old and assuming that the dark was not the place to be, I resumed my quest. Very carefully, however: careful with the words themselves (e.g. enlightenment as explained in previous posts), and trying to avoid to get dazzled instead.

But then, wherever I looked for alternative belief systems, I found there were mainly two options:
- or you choose one system that seems the best and accept it as a full pack; (in consequence you don't question their people and you assume the unbelievable part of it)
- or you study very closely every system available and take the small good pieces of each of them; (but those pieces don't necessarily make sense when are taken stand-alone, and the pieces from different origins don't match together either, and there's the huge risk you get puzzled)


Should I had stayed in the dark then? I didn't, and on the road I've met quite some people following the second (including myself, I'm afraid), which is a sure path from endarkenment to endazzlement.

maya

In a hindu myth, a student asks to his master about the meaning of maya; the master says
- Ufff
and asks the student to go to a village nearby to get a glass of water for him; there the guy goes and knocks the door of the first house he finds, he's really in a hurry to know about the maya thing. A beautiful girl opens it and takes him in, she's captivating, her smile and her humble eyes not daring to look up. The family was about to have lunch and the father invites the student to sit down and eat with them; afterwards there's lots of work to do, the young guy cannot refuse and makes a big effort to help them. He stays for dinner, and then he's so tired...

A few days after the father proposes his daughter to marry him (that's usually the way it works in India) and he's already so enchanted and pleased by her that he immediately accepts. The marriage is fast, simple and full of bliss, and for the following years the guy keeps on working very hard in the farm, has three children, takes care of them and the rest of the family, and he feels happier than ever in his life.

In the month of the tenth birthday of his oldest son the monsoon starts, it's early for the rains, which are terrible, the river overflows and there's a terrible flood in which he looses everything: his wife and children die; the house, the animals, crops and all his possessions are swept away. He feels a deep grief and aimlessly he walks into the forest; sitting under a tree he finds his old master and he hardly recognizes him,
- where have you been? I only asked you to fetch some water for me -asks the master
and laughs (somewhat bitterly) and explains the student that over these years he has just experienced what maya is.


Sometimes, when I've talked with some Indians friends about Descartes' method of doubt (not that I mention this so often, but I've always enjoyed this view of the world being run by dwarfs that had constructed my room and everything in it to deceive me, since nothing really exists, and they would quickly build up my kitchen before I notice it wasn't there if I decided to go and get a glass of water, etc) in response my Indian colleagues would relate it to the image to maya. When I have finally read a hindu myth on the subject, instead of philosophical it sounds to me like one of those parables of a fussy and changeable god. And it's silly but I cannot help feeling a bit disillusioned.