"How good it is when brothers and sisters dwell together in harmony."
That was the huge banner hanging on the back wall of the church.
My wife and I had come to be with Krishna Das, who has been singing Hindu holy music since he went to India 40 years ago. As a bonus, Krishna Das would be celebrating the 40th anniversary of the publication of Be Here Now with a short film and a beamed-in visit with its author, Ram Dass.
Who in the spiritual set doesn't love Krishna Das? And as for Ram Dass -- how many people were inspired to start on the path by their reading of his landmark book? So the mood in the church was powerfully... well, harmonious. Picture it: more than a thousand friendly people, eager for a group experience of divine love.
I wasn't feeling it.
This very day, every Republican in the Senate pledged to block all legislation until the president endorsed a continuation of tax cuts for the rich. "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" -- here to stay. A crucial arms control treaty -- won't be signed. A continuation of benefits for the chronically unemployed --- not happening.
I was livid.
When will the poor, the gays in the military, the children who don't want missiles landing on their homes stop being so goddamn cheap and start buying politicians like the special interests do?
Oh. Right. They can't afford K Street lobbyists.
Okay, I tell myself, we must start where we are. And where I am, as soon as Krishna Das starts his harmonium going, is in a very good place. I have flunked out of Judaism, failed to master meditation, read Buddhist texts instead of doing the practice. But Hinduism 101 -- an evening of kirtan, a Hindu prayer service that takes the form of a singalong -- just might be possible for me.
Little problem, however. Here is Ram Dass, talking about meeting his guru, and passing on Maharaj-ji's core message. And what he is saying is: "Love everybody." More or less like this:
I understand. But really -- love John Boehner? Rush? Glenn Beck? Sarah Palin?
And I could go on.
But there's no wiggle room in Maharaj-ji's message. And Krishna Das and Ram Dass, in passing it on, don't insert any qualifiers. "Love everybody." That's it.
In the protected space of this church, for a lot of other people, it seems to work. (By "people," I mean mostly women. For whatever reason -- and I can suggest a few -- fewer men respond to this vibration.) Many are not beautiful in any conventional sense, and yet, as I scan the room, I hear The Beatles' line: "How does it feel to be one of the beautiful people?" Off to the side, I spot a woman dancing. There's no more concise way to say this: To see her dance is to know how she makes love -- she's that free. There was a time when I'd look at a women dancing like that and think, "Yeah, I could hit that." Tonight, what I think is: "How am I ever going to get there?"
Make no mistake: If Krishna Das wanted everyone here to be dancing with abandon, he could make that happen. As a performer, he's completely natural. But that ease is deceptive -- he's a great showman, with a keen sense of pacing. And if you're obsessed with the Big Picture, the show he's putting on is, quite literally, The Greatest Show on Earth. It's to his credit that he doesn't incite mass ecstasy.
I don't want to make this evening sound like some granola party. Just the opposite -- "Love Everyone" kicked me hard and brought up a ton of shit. Which I got to look at, close up. Not a bad thing. Just a very hard thing, this moving away from the mind and into the heart.
"A book doesn't give a living transmission," Ram Dass has said. Yes, but I'm addicted to reading. So of course I went back and re-read Be Here Now. Maybe I'm skittish about looking back at the folly that was my own life in 1970, but I wasn't as captivated by the book as I'd been Back Then.
The new book by Ram Dass, Be Love Now: The Path of the Heart, was much more bracing. How could it not be? Maharaji died in 1973, but by then, Ram Dass knew him very well -- and as he'd be the first to say, he's come to know his guru a great deal better since his death. The first part of the book is about Maharaji's teachings; it's mercifully brief, because, after all, Maharaji's message is so very simple. After that, the book is mostly stories -- what it was like to be around an enlightened master.
If you think The Miraculous is just sleight-of-hand --- Siegfried & Roy, performed by a guy in a diaper --- this is not the book for you. Maharaji stops trains. Reads minds. Appears in several places at once. Consider the bus story:
"Miracles only happen for those who believe in them," C.S. Lewis wrote. Well, I want to believe. But not just for me. I want to believe that John Boehner will suddenly have a vision of an unemployed father wondering how he's going to buy just one present for his kids at Christmas. I want to believe that Rush will have a vision of the size of the mountain of lies he has told for so many years. I want to believe Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin will have a vision of the ways words morph into weapons. I want to believe, with the words on the last frame of one of the Ram Dass videos, that we can "Love People, Feed People, Serve People, Remember God."
First -- unfortunately -- I've got to make some peace with myself. And in this effort, I do believe that Ram Dass and Krishna Das can be good allies.
BONUS: Krishna Das
To buy the paperback of Be Here Now from Amazon, click here. For the Kindle edition, click here.
To buy Be Love Now from Amazon, click here. For the Kindle edition, click here.
Cross-posted from HeadButler.com
Vamsee Juluri: Sathya Sai Baba: A Love this World Can Hardly Reciprocate
Rose Marie Berger: Christian Support for Repealing DADT is a Double-Edged Sword
Anju Bhargava: Holi: Colorful Celebration of Equality
To love Beck, Limbaugh etc. means in practice to help them see the error of their ways and repent. That would be doing them a great service. Being of service to someone is to love that someone.
Now, you may have doubts whether they are really willing to see the error of their ways. In practice, you have a finite life in which you cannot do everything and help everyone. So the practical route is to maximize benefit and help those closest to you who are more ready to receive your help.
In practice, “love everyone” means love the person(s) you are interacting with at any one time - no need to worry about everyone in the abstract. That love is to be expressed by being good to them, which can involve either a physical act (e.g. help the poor or the sick) or a spiritual act (help them become better persons).
If I were to meet Limbaugh or Beck face to face I would try to show them the error of their ways (and perhaps book them a session with a psychiatrist). I would not be capable of harming them. I would simply want to try and help them become better people. I think so would you. Therefore, you already love even those you think you don't.
Do not mistake "love everyone" for "like everyone".
There is however a limit and we have to draw some distinctions. There are people who demonstrably spread misinformation and lies, in which case, looking for the good point in their position is not beneficial. It's one thing to look for the goodness in a person and another to look for the good points of a position that person may take.
If you are trying to help someone become a better person, you are acknowledging that they have goodness in them otherwise they would never be able to change. At the same time, their position may not have any redeeming value. These are distinctions that we are responsible for making and if we refuse to make them, the humility of learning becomes one of ignorance. I do not have to employ even a moment's thought to consider the good points of Limbaugh's position that Obama is a dangerous socialist etc. etc. Nor do I have to consider the good points of creationism. That would not only be a waste of time, it would also put lies and truth on the same footing.
they are selfish and ignorant and lack empathy for others. how can we love them.
the key word is ignorance. they are ignorant of their true being as an expression of the Infinite.
the culprit is always ignorance. the enlightened hindus know this but seldom teach it.
but some even most will say but they know better. really do they know better? if they knew better they would not be selfish and ignorant. who among us is not ignorant to some degree?
if one becomes very observant one can see all levels of soul development on this planet.
look at most demos and repubs they appear to come from different planets.
look close at a repub mentality. those folks have not reached a level of empathy yet for anyone outside their families. but they will everyone evolves if not in this life then another. if not in this world then another.
find the origin of that ignorance and that may help but remember we all are still in some level of ignorance so dont fret that you cannot love everyone. but you will give it time and experiences and karma.
a quote that may help. or not. :-)
“The ways are but two: love and the want of love.”
Mencius 300 BC
Alison
www.heathjournalist.com
It's so much more interesting and wonderful to love people than to treat them with ideological contempt - at least I believe so. But I'm not expecting to change the world with the force of my opinions and beliefs.
His complait was how South Korea, having become a wealthy nation, thanks in a very, very large part of good old American generosity, refusing to make fair and equitable trade agreements, and won't budge. But, they expect us to protect them from the N. Koreans, and sure enough, off we go running............all around the world we do this, losing jobs, and sinking into further debt.
Paraphrasing Golda Meir: When Americans start loving American citizens and children, more then they hate them, we will shift our whole focus on the rest of the world, and appropriately and benevolently focus on our own. Our children are hungry too, not just others. Our children are falling way behind their's and that is our fault, not their.
I try to be nice. That statement may startle some people who know me, in part because we have different opinions about what's nice. But I do have may own standards of niceness, and when I violate them it leaves a sour taste and does not satisfy.
http://thewrongmonkey.blogspot.com/