It also makes me think of the Easter...six? Seven years ago? When I woke up to find out my spiritual teacher and hero had died, and me never having gotten to make a pilgrimage to see him in person. A good lesson in not putting off the important things. But also a lesson in acceptance. Lots of lessons really, since he had said previously that
a) he was going to live till 95 or 96 and
b) what he said must inevitably happen.
And he was only... I think around 86? When he died. I think some of his followers tried to explain it via lunar years? It's an interesting conundrum. For a normal person to understand it I think I need to invoke an imaginary theoretical situation: suppose you know of a real live super hero, someone like Superman, who flies around and stuff. One of his super powers is omniscience. You've heard lots and lots of stories from reliable sources, of him knowing basically anything he wants, at will, and many stories of him predicting things with astounding accuracy. Predicting that a tiny village will become a huge bustling town with it's own airport. Predicting accidents, marriages, sicknesses, healings. And seemingly defying the laws of physics and medicine that we know of. Able to manifest matter from nothing, able to raise the dead like he was walking out of the Bible or something. But then he predicts when he'd going to die, and he proceeds to die at a different time, saying that the work he came to do, is completed to his satisfaction, a decade or so early. What would that mean? What would that mean about him, what would that mean about predictions of the future? As you see, I still have lessons to learn yet from that. In any case, Easter makes me reflect on that rather huge event in my life.
Oh, I've got another rather large event, perhaps you'd call it a revelation, that happened recently. Hold on, I forgot if I mentioned this previously... looks like not. There is a series of books translated from Russian, the first book is called Anastasia, the series is called "The Ringing Cedars of Russia." It reads like a mixture of magic and Star-Trek and ranges from how to build a permaculture homestead to how to raise a child. The main character is another person who seems to have super-powers. Only this story is far more sketchy. Only the author has met this person and been shown the super powers. No other witnesses. It is presented as non-fiction, as a first hand account by the author. Many times it stretches credibility, but to someone who's read "Autobiography of a Yogi" and pretty much believed it, this story seems at least within the realm of possibility, though improbable. But the ideas presented, the beautiful possible future, sounds so appealing, and so many things seem to ring of truths I've read about elsewhere.. except it goes much further. It is extremely exciting, I stay up late into the night because I can't put it down. If it is true, then it's super important to listen to. Then there is lots and lots of really good information, that could make life so much better. How to build a beautiful home, create love that lasts, raise children that are wise and happy.
That book series changed the trajectory of my life. I switched majors, I discovered Tom Brown Jr., I got into Permaculture and sustainable living, I tried to learn how to garden. It wasn't a totally different goal, but it was a very different flavor of the goal I was going towards.
And then I went on with my life, and followed my own inner wisdom, and kind of left it on the back-burner, something to get back to once I'd sorted out some more immediate and dysfunctional stuff. And, many years later, I check back in with the writer, and find that, at least in a little way, with one sentence, and something that someone on the internet concluded, that it was a lie. He apparently admitted that it was a fictionalized account, to make his ideas more easy to swallow.
Did I mention I hate lying? In all it's forms. Even when it's lying for so called "good reasons" Hate it. Of course, looking from this new, tenuous viewpoint, the pieces of the puzzle fall more sensibly into place. Now even if he retracted that statement, I don't think I would go back to believing him. It was a beautiful dream, and I so wanted it to be true. I never committed to the extend I would have if I had totally believed him, but I was having enough faith in the veracity of the account to test out his various recipes for things, and see for myself if they worked or not. A serious commitment of time and energy, in itself.
If I was more invested in this, I would be absolutely devastated. Like a little kid who found out about the tooth fairy or had a Santa-gate experience. As it was, there was a profound sense of imbalance for a few days. It made me re-asses and question everything I had believed in. If this was a lie, how much more of what I believed was a lie?
This world is so full of lies. Everyone trying to get something from you, to get you to listen to them, follow them, do what they want, give them your money, time, attention, admiration. And so many willing to lie to do it.
I despise it. Most of the lies are not big lies. Most of it is... just a little bit of bending the truth. Just a little cheating. Someone asks what you do in your job and you say something that makes your job sound more glamorous than it is. You take two cheese samples at the supermarket even though the sign says one sample each. You say you've been working even though mostly you've been watching you tube videos. Almost everyone does this kid of dishonesty. It's all about being a little bit of a coward. I don't mean to disparage people for this, I include myself in this group. but I don't want to do that any more. It's like being just a little bit dirty. You don't realize how much nicer it feels to be clean until you take a shower. These little bits of dishonesty, we acclimate to them, we rationalize them away. But when you decide to get rid of them, you realize how much better it feels.
We all have conscience, something that tells us when what we are doing feels right and in integrity, or not. We all ignore our conscience sometimes. I can think of times when I've distinctly not stopped to ask it's opinion, because I wanted to do something, and I knew it would object, and I didn't want to be stopped from doing the thing.
But all these little lies... they make me so angry. They make me angry at others, but those strong emotions directed outwards always trip an internal alert reminding me that I am the one with the issue, and I need to look inside for what needs changing.
I just want to be authentic. I just want to be stringently, 100% authentic about who I am. Not lying to others is just the outermost crust of it. even more central is not lying to myself. Even more central is not betraying my own internal sense of what is right and wrong. Even, or especially, when it's leading me somewhere uncomfortable. I think that's the only productive channel for my frustration with untruth.
This is my objective: Radical Authenticity. To thine own self be true, 100%. (and it then follows (as night follows day) that you cannot be false to any man) I think this is the only way I can ever have respect for myself. To be knowingly doing something wrong... how can you ever feel truly good about yourself? But it's easy to rationalize and sooth our aching conscience, to numb it and distract ourselves from it. But you give up...I don't know exactly what it is... I don't know what to call it, but it's a very deep and important part. Something that feels very real and solid, like a thick tree root, deeply anchored, whereas so much of the world is smoke and mirrors, quickly vanishing satisfaction and pleasure and craving. Fame, adoration, power, wealth, importance. Vanity. Comfort, security, pleasure. Novocaine, distractions from the nasty emptiness waiting to confront us if we ever have a quiet moment.
Is my entire life meaningless? or worse? It's easy to not think about these questions, and common because, I think, the only way to feel that deeper sense of meaning is to be following that deep root of rightness, of being true to your self and your inherent sense of what is good.
Otherwise, we have to live on the surface of life, because if we settle down to the root, we face the empty meaninglessness.
The one bit of advice I've found essential in this, is remember its about Truth and Love. Sometimes in the search for truth, it can get a bit dry, a bit hard. That's not right. Trying to do what is true and right without letting the essence of it be moved and directed by the energy of love is like trying to make a person by stitching together dead body parts like Frankenstein. It looks like a man, but it is not a man, it is a corpse. You need that lightning, that energy of love, to be a living thing.
I've got more bits of writing and drawing from my past, but it is very late for me, so it will have to wait. I also have that extra bit of writing, but it needs some heavy editing before it's ready for prime-time. So this will have to be all for now.
Passover, Easter, Eostra, and so many other celebrations of the coming spring, of rebirth, renewal, awakening, are happening. It's a good time to celebrate the coming of new life, fresh green and blooming early flowers and our own internal rebirth into something new. May this year spiral upwards in the eternal cycle for you and not just round and round the same old track.
And hah! This did also kind of end up being about april fools. After all, that holiday is all about lying to people for you own amusement. And it's good to remember, when I'm getting flustered about dishonestly, hey, don't take yourself so seriously. Someone just played an April fools on you.
To spring, and new life! To authenticity, and amusement.
-Isaac
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