|
Siri Simran: Walking up the mountain, step by step
|
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Apr. 29th, 2009|01:14 am] |
For the longest time, I've been thinking and thinking and not really getting any further for it that I would have otherwise. There are very simple experiences that prove to myself I am not my mind, and regardless of what I think and the ways I think it (including some very negative and habitual thinking patterns), there remains elements of me being-ness that is well beyond the reach of the mind.
More then, the feeling that is creeping up on me that perhaps, the notion of directing my life, somehow grasping it by its invisible, slippery metaphorical reins, is not a wise or indeed practical thing to do. That there is a certain illusion of choice and free will, that there may be decisions, yes, but to shape and direct everything? Perhaps some other lifetime, some other path, but apparantly not this one, or at least not in the full frontal attack mode that I am accustomed to, like steering a ship by lifting it up bodily out of the water then plonking it down after turning it in the direction it should be going in. Not efficient.
Karmic inertia, perhaps, or lack of will and discipline. Or just wasted energy pushing at a door marked "pull". The search for an alternative that is beyond what I can see, and beyond what I know I cannot see, is hopefully going to produce a new approach. Something that does not involve crippling amounts of effort expended as if burning so much hydrogen - loud bang, with a wet finish.
On the other hand, I am having fun. I am enjoying my music again, I am having fun dancing tango. what concerns me is my moral character, the fortitude of my personality, etc etc, none of which worrying about has ever managed to improve. There is a battle in my mind, one that should not be taking place - should not, because the enemy is imaginary, as is the conflict, but it is such a deeply ingrained habit to fight! or at lest, to set up positions as if in a fight, coupled with neurotic levels of fear of losing versus a manic swing towards the arrogance of the already victorious.
Unnecessarily abstract? You bet. This is an open journal entry. No specifics, and anyway, specifics are far too dead. |
|
|
| You and Me and We |
[Apr. 2nd, 2009|12:02 am] |
You and Me and We
We'd like to think, you an' me,
Without us, the universe can't be.
We think if we weren't around,
A falling tree would make no sound.
But truth be told, our greatest fear
Is that the universe won't shed a tear
If you and me, we disappeared,
Vanished, gone, no longer here.
Everything else, they'll be just fine,
The sun, the moon, and the stars will shine,
And there'll be no one here to disagree
That things are better without you an' me. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Apr. 1st, 2009|11:26 pm] |
I have been keeping an eye out for writings and articles on the end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it, and though I was convinced that we are all doomed, I'm starting to change my mind. At least, I'm starting to alter my view of "the big one", the single event which will result in a mad-max like existence. Perhaps we will all end up with no choice but to get mohikan hair cuts and dress with 80s power pads while fighting endless tides of bloodthirsty motorcycle riding leatherclad dwarves, but somehow, I dunno, it seems unlikely.
Not that the human civilisation is doing itself any favours, though, in terms of surviving, but there is something better than preparing to duke it out on ruined highways with enraged one eyed tribes of mutant pinheads (who are covetous of your normal-sized-heads, both an affront to their pinhead god, and also a prized offering to secure a mate).
I'm not too sure how to account for this wellspring of relative optimism (it is relative - I don't believe things are all going to be bunnies and roses, unless they're mutant zombie rabbits), but it may be connected with the people I've been meeting - perfectly ordinary people doing perfectly ordinarily inspiring things that they enjoy doing. Perhaps I'm wrong, and I'll be the last to curse at the sky as I'm hatcheted in the back by a screeching amazon wearing a feather boa made of armadillos in the thunderdome. Perhaps I'll just be a hapless pedestrian run over by the great car chase that's burning up the world's last drop of petrol. Nonetheless, I'm throwing my lot in with the people who are wholeheartedly doing those beautiful things that makes them, and those touched by them, more human. |
|
|
| Teachers |
[Mar. 8th, 2009|04:45 pm] |
I had a maths teacher when I first arrived in the UK called Mr. Saunders. I've always thought of him when I try to think about how a teacher should be, or could be... inspiring.
At that time my maths education was a few years ahead of the UK, and I already knew my multiplication tables, so I was messing around when he was teaching that in class. When I finally exhausted his patience (as the new foreign student, I had some leeway), he turned and set me a problem and told me to be quiet ("HUSH, child"). It was something alond the lines of 123456789x987654321 and soon I lost count of the number of hundreds of thousands to carry, nowhere finished by the end of class. It was a clear point, finely made to teach me: don't feel too cocky.
A few days later, still feeling stung, I doodled a face in my homework book, labelling it "SOS", Mr Saunders' nickname. He returned it after marking the homework, having added his own curly beard that I had originally missed out.
These were good lessons, for me. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Feb. 20th, 2009|12:23 am] |
Mango.
Change the first letter and:
Tango.
Therefore Tango is the newly sanctified art of the Mango gods. |
|
|
| Disturbing test dream |
[Jan. 30th, 2009|01:11 am] |
I had a disturbing dream recently, where I was taking a test of some sort. We were partnered up, me with my (girlfriend? Friend? Anyway, I don't know her in my waking life), to do a maths test. Unfortunately, I couldn't find the questions. All I could see was a pile of roughly scrawled notes and crumpled up sheets that were used to work things out. My partner would read the questions to me - she could obviously see them - but I couldn't understand her, and felt more and more desperate as I leafed through piles of paper with scribbles on them with no questions.
Then I realised it was already far too late in the morning and I should get out of bed already.
I would have thought I would be past the stage of having exam anxiety dreams, but perhaps this is a pretty good description of my life right now - I am sitting a test of some sort, only I have no idea what is being asked. Apparently everyone else can see it but I can't, and I can't understand them when they tell me what it is. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Jan. 19th, 2009|11:42 pm] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | The Ancestor - Randy Roos | ] |
What is it with monosyllabic yoga studio names in Taipei? We have:
Space Yoga
True Yoga
Pure Yoga
Soon to be joined by:
Be Yoga
Do we only have enough space in our short term memory to remember one syllable? Perhaps there will be Brain Yoga to help us improve our memory capacity. |
|
|
| The testament of mangos |
[Dec. 11th, 2008|11:42 pm] |
Instead of grappling with such important and profound questions of spiritulaility, such as, "can't I have fun and believe in God at the same time?", or "if I was starving on a desert island with nothing else to eat and I ate meat, will i go to hell?", and the old chestnut, "if I'm good and made money but didn't believe in God, will i go to hell?" and my favourite, "what the hell is hell anyway?", I much prefer to grapple with a large, juicy mango. There are many advantages to grappling with mangos rather than deeply abstract, profound and spiritual questions, such as:
A mango is just a mango, rather than an onion, or a finger pointing at the moon, or an eternal issue that exists forever and only at the very present moment simultaneously.
A mango is juicy. Philosophical spiritual questions less so.
Mangos sound fun.
Mangos are good to eat.
Unfortunately in the depths of winter, there are no large juicy mangos to be had. More unfortunately, there are always and will forever be an inexhaustable supply of philosophical spiritual questions, but it's also immensely satisfying to conclude that most of the time, these questions are beside the point. Coming up with an A+ grade essay answer to these questions has never been, as far as I know, a surefire way to enlightenment, and as far as I can tell, eating a mango has never been explicitly listed as a sinful activity.
I've always liked mangos, ever since I can tell the difference between a mango and all other types of foodstuffs. Yellow fleshy fragrant mangos are a joy, and the sound of the name, "Mango", is the most juicy fruit name I know of. It's a happy name, immensely suited to such a devastatingly good fruit.
Mangos forever. |
|
|
| Siri Simran invades China |
[Dec. 10th, 2008|10:56 pm] |
And whyever would I want to do that?
Apart from the commonly accepted perception of China as some sort of endless treasure mine, it's also seen (albeit more subconsciously) as the biggest threat to the balance of world power, the world environment, the American way of life and all that we could possibly hold precious as human beings, etc.
I have ot admit, I don't like being censored, or feel like I'm being censored, and I'm beginning to suspect I'm actually a rather subversive streak running through my otherwise lazy life. I don't like overt authority and conformity, for the plain reason that I don't conform comfortably. it's selfish. Perhaps if I did conform without needing to expend a great deal of effort, I would not mind, but as it is, I don't. This is hardly a great ideological base from which to build some eternal philosophical truth, but that's not what I'm after anyway.
Back to China, and the love for speeches by leaders, some of whom I know, most of whom I don't. The ones I know (or know of), they are generally sound, hard working bureaucrats, with a genuine sense of caring for those around them. Leadership is provided for by sheer force of presence, as I see it, if they're not driven insane or turned into automiton robots by the hierarchical government system, they've totally earned the respect they're accorded by those around them.
Where do I fit in? I have no idea. As it is, they have no idea either, It seems that there's a 50% failure rate in communications, that literally every other word I say is misinterpreted. Perhaps it's my accent, I don't know.
But back to invading China. There is something amusing in retrospect that I dislike this place so much, yet I'm finding it impossible to resist the lure of _Becoming Someone_ here. Arrogance and anecdote suggests that I am well qualified, humility and cowardice cautions me against being too cocky. Really, as my parents always like to remind me, I don't really know how weighty I am, and it's true, I don't. It cuts both ways, not knowing where it's possible to exert influence, and where the limits of that influence extends, is very confusing, like a baby not knowing quite where its skin ends and the outside world begins. Unfortunately, unlike a baby, my cowardice and caution curtails my exploration. then again, moving slow is possibly the best way forwards.
It seems all and sundry are eager to look for a suitable wife for me. By suitable, of course, is meant, any human female who has a name, and who might vaguely meet an abstract "criteria" that I gave, implied through my behaviour, was imagined to be nice by the erstwhile matchmaker, fell out of the sky into the brain of God, or otherwise spun like a political hot potato until it vaguely resembles something that I might possibly like or dislike or have no idea about. In any case, people wantme married, and be double quick about it.
Back in china, people are still smoking like dragons, whisps of smoke carving the air like patterns on a ming vase. I hate the smell of tobacco smoke and ashes. But I do like the exploration that could take place, finding out that people here are not perhaps so terrifying as I feel they are (indeed, that people in generall are not secretly harbouring the desire to remove their latex face masks and reveal the acid-teethed lizard-alien-insectoid underneath who will then proceed to massacre, um, me). It's good to find those bejewelled moments when truth and honesty and humanity are communicated and experienced by everyone, especially in a place where I least expect it, and however precious those moments are, they somehow feed a desperate hunger in me.
Speaking of being hungry, pigs brains and living prawn-critters being boiled in front me is not really that pleasant either, nor is the assumption that alcohol must be consumed by everyone whenever there is the vaguest excuse to consume it, and failure to comply is a sign of disrespect. Practically, it would be much easier to drop these two taboos, and indeed they have been very much relaxed to accommodate my lack of discipline and the sheer weirdness of human beings. Nevertheless, I don't like drinking, and I don't like eating pigs brains and living-until-boiled-to-death-prawn-critters and other meat-ish products, morality aside, religion aside, health aside. i just don't like it, in the same way other people don't like oranges, or they dislike fishcakes, or whatever.
Given that, and given the whole shabang of shit-not-yet-hitting-the-fan-but-will-in-the-future-soon-to-be, I really have no idea how I'll survive, should I even make it off the metaphorical landing ramp onto the metaphorical beachhead of my China invasion metaphore, without being blown to pieces or cut down by a hail of paranoia and doubt. Still, it shold be fun trying. |
|
|
| Severing ties with Raj Academy and Professor Surinder Singh |
[Dec. 10th, 2008|12:37 am] |
So.
India is an interesting place, it seems to highlight those things we don't want to see. It's a fun thing, sometimes, like looking at a funhouse mirror, or less fun, like looking into the sewers of the soul.
I din't really want to see someone I admire and respect, turn out to behave in an untrustworthy and totally amoral way, even less so that these dubious qualities were serving a very selfish goal, in the name of Guru. Unfortunately (or fortunately), I also saw that in these matters, I can trust my senses.
I know I'm not the first to have had disagreements with Professor Surinder Singh, and I'm certainly not the last, and regardless of some very ugly rumours that I've heard, my own perception of the man was that of someone I could trust. However, my experience of travelling in a group with him this year has quite successfully destroyed that trust. I can't say I've learned nothing from him or Raj Academy, but I can say I will not continue studying with them. If the behaviour I experienced and saw was of any indication, it doesn't matter the quality of the musical knowledge that is being imparted, I don't want my learning to be shaped by such hands.
Oh well. At least that chapter of my musical journey is closed. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Oct. 4th, 2008|01:30 am] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Gurdjieff 05 - Gurdjieff/Dr. Hartmann | ] |
It is possible to be such a rebel, rebelling against rebelling that I come full circle and end up where I began, conforming in order to rebel against rebelling?
Or maybe, that this is where I belong, and all the dreams, beauty, fantasies that I see, they are treasures equal to what I already have, and that to go after them is both the epitome of greed and the nadir of my poverty.
Either way, I dislike it when mosquitos bite me on the bottom of my feet. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Sep. 22nd, 2008|12:24 am] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | tanpura D - White Raagini box | ] |
There's been time to write lots about. Or there's been lots of time to write about. Either way, something amusing. We went to a short two part presentation about investing in these uncertain times, titled something like "how to deal with the sub prime crisis and global inflation".
The first part was presented by an economic journalist, who spent about half an hour explaining exactly how bad, how widespread, deep and uncertain the current crisis really is, kind of like, "this is how bad things are, but just in case you think it might be a blip, here's something even worse." Reasonably, he explained that a glut of credit and unwarranted capital inflated a balloon so huge in the past few years that this crash was inevitable from the very start. Now the situation is totally untenable (to his credit, the journalist pointed out that this was a system level crisis, and the usual tinkering with monetary policy would fall far short of fixing the problems. In fact, the whole problem was caused by an unwise use of interest rates to boost the US out of its previous economic crisis around 2001, kind of like feeding amphetamines to a caffeine addict suffering from withdrawl symptoms, then after that wore off, giving him intravenous injections of freebased meth). Commodities prices are all over the place as money rushes in and out to take shelter, while governments run around headlessly with money spurting out of their necks to try and put out the ever growing bushfires.
Anyway, in short, his presentation concluded, "hold onto your cash". Hide it under the pillow, he didn't add, but didn't really need to.
The second presentation, poor guy, was from a small investment company, a tiny operation with a branch in Someplace, California, and another branch in the Cayman Islands. Hardly awe inspiring, but following on from the first presentation, this guy was faced with an already impossible task, compounded by an inane Powerpoint slide show that would have seemed flaccid when times were good (smiling suited guys leaning back relaxed in green fields, people shaking hands pointlessly, pictures of graphs going up (I've never gotten the point of having pictures of graphs going up, how many people will be fooled into thinking, "wow, those pictures of graphs are going up, that must mean times are good! Here, take my money!"), slides listing the qualifications of the firm, which amounted to, as far as I can tell, the fact that they are registered, and the guys running the show actually have passed the relevant state level exams). My mother and I looked at each other, and decided it would be cruelty to stay and listen to the presenter struggling through his script, and we left.
It's amusing simply because it was just... cruel, like watching Mickey Mouse or Barney being put through a mincing machine, but funny because I'll bet people would keep watching while clucking their tongues in moral disapproval, without really wanting to stop it happening at all. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Sep. 17th, 2008|12:06 am] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | tanpura D - White Raagini box | ] |
Once my perspective changed, things became both more complicated and more immediate than I thought before.
Before, it was so simple. Family and taiwan = Bad, staying in the UK to learn Gurmat Sangeet = Good.
OK, not so facile, but largely that's what it can be boiled down to.
Now, though, it's not so simple, mainly because there are mutinous parts of myself that are beginning to believe - with good reason - that perhaps family and taiwan are not so bad after all, and that perhaps, just perhaps, my vitriol against them was deployed prematurely.
Regrettably perhaps, I already screwed up a rather important relationship, mainly that between myself and Abnashi. Though I'm "getting over it", it's not been as easy to avoid the feeling of dejection / regret / shame / jealousy (yes, jealousy) / guilt and lust, as I would have liked.
Nevertheless, it's not as if staying here with my family is entirely without merit, given that I don't need to worry about where the next meal is coming from, I have clean clothes to wear, people who care for me (albeit in ways and fashions that I have difficulty accepting), and I have at least a nominal - if not actual - obligation to stick around, if only because of all the stuff that has been done for me, that all I need to do is come back and pick things up and I'll have it all made. To be a made man, as it were.
The fly in the ointment? Well, I'll need to learn to compromise, go easy on being vegetarian, go easy on being "Sikh" (my concept of being sikh is coming under fire, more of which later), and of course, live without the benefit of a sangat, without the benefit of learning shabads and raags.
Question is, does that matter? More pressing, does that matter to me?
Here begin the questioning. Why am I sikh? What does it mean? All the articles and online experience I read refer to people who at least have some sort of blood tie, family tie, some kind of root in the "sikh tradition". I don't. In fact, according to my family's perspective, me adopting the sikh way of life has been a net negative influence on my own fortunes, and has contributed not one whit to the well being of my family. So not only am I questioning what being a sikh means to me, I am also questioning, well, what am i getting out of it?
And it's a fair question. I've discovered and seen so many more character flaws in myself that it's numbing. I'm not a better person, nor am I being a better person to those around me (whom I assiduously avoid whenever possible, or am outright rude to in order to minimise contact). I am not a spiritually developed person, I have lax discipline, and my material life is poverty stricken, as is my creative life, love life (as in love for other beings, currently I don't love other beings). Mostly, though, I am troubled by a sense of total self centeredness. I can't make myself care about other people. I feel very little for them or from them.
The million dollar question is, why should I bother? If I'm just as spiritually impoverished in London as I am in Taiwan, then why the hell shouldn't I be spiritually impoverished in a comfortable environment? At least I can pretend with "the rest of them" that I'm leading a meaningful life. At least instead of wearing my clothes until they're threadbare, I can have some modicum of self respect and buy new shirts. At least I would be guilty of one less sin, that of pretending to be spiritual when in fact I feel just a barren as the Gobi desert.
Looking back provides little comfort, since my motives for becoming sikh is at best murky, and at worst an attempt to deny my mortality by "transcending" the mundane, boring, not-good-enough-for-me world. God is an excuse, religion is a shield, a convenient excuse to cover my own faults.
Progress through this journey has been marked by remarkable acts of doing the right things for the wrong reasons. I haven't learned. Or, if I learned anything at all, it's that anger is no substitute for real courage. Since I've now run out of surface level, easily accessible anger, I find myself a coward. I don't want to die. I don't want to lead an impoverished life. I don't want to go towards a goal I have no inkling of, and worse have no idea what direction it lies in.
So I think I'm in a bit of a funk right now. I don't know what I'm doing, and I have no idea how to do it, or why I'm doing it.
In other news, I had one of my wisdom tooth extracted today, and my jaws ache. A little. But they ache. |
|
|
| Here we kissed |
[Sep. 6th, 2008|11:46 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | love, poem, poetry | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Koee Jaan Na Bhulai Bhaee - Parbhati Mahala 1 Dakhanee - Prof Surinder Singh | ] |
Here we kissed
A memory.
Here we kissed, our fingers making us lovers,
Our hearts breathless,
Here, beside the mountain road.
Above, lit by the Pole Star,
The sky bared its silken skin, teasing the night,
Breathing softly onto sighing leaves.
Entwined in the shadows of trees, the road traced uphill,
Tasting the soft contours of the earth,
Intimately received into the warm darkness.
Here, promise and imagination pressed against each other,
Whispering, caressing, embracing, gasping,
Vowing between breaths
To stay together.
A memory.
Now, the Pole Star shines alone.
All around me,
The sky, the night, the road,
Embraced, caressed,
Whispered nothing.
I opened my hand, dropped this memory
Beside the mountain road,
Where we kissed, where our fingers made us lovers,
Our hearts breathless.
Here it remains.
Here we kissed.
|
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Aug. 24th, 2008|11:23 am] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  Hey, free wi-fi! | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | The Airport | ] |
The airport provides strange relief from the surreal cocoon at home (my grandparents' home) for the past two weeks.
Cocoon, because it is a transformative experience (not yet complete, and not that pleasant) Surreal, because it is a world apart from London, literally and psychologically.
I'm returning to London to pack my stuff into storage, and returning right back to Taiwan. I feel homesick, because I don't feel like I have a home. I pray that some miracle will bring the two halves of my world together. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Aug. 17th, 2008|06:32 pm] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Maan Nimaney Tu Dhanee Tera Bharvasa - Prof Surinder Singh | ] |
I am amused. Bear with me, there is precious little to be amused about in this place, but this...
Every time in the past, when I have been in Taiwan, there were two issues which were always contested. One is my vegetarian diet. Two is my unshorn hair.
Guess what? During the 49 day period of bereavement, we are 1) observing a vegetarian diet and 2) not allowed to cut our hair or shave.
I also found out that the mantra of the Chinese Buddhists is: "Namo Amitabha (buddha)" (南無阿彌陀佛). Probably not news to anyone but me, but still, it's nice to know.
Every 7 days after death, for 49 days, we read parts from Buddhist scriptures (it's day 8 now). It's a good feeling, almost like home, reading from the Guru. The words are sometimes difficult to understand, but there are passages that I relate to - most likely distorted by my perspective and poor understanding, but which I relate to nonetheless.
Some passages begin with "and this I heard", kind of like "once upon a time". They recorded the teachings of the Buddha or major disciples - who was there, how many, who asked questions, etc. One passage, a price came to ask to be blessed. To paraphrase, he said, that
"If I should be born of low birth, in poverty, in pain or in disease
"If I should be born with all the vices, evil thoughts, sins and without virtue
"If I should be born with deformities, missing limbs, or with incurable disease
"If I should be born with all misfortunes, bad luck, or without awareness
"I pray that Your light should guide me then as you guide me in this life."
Which, after all, is what we pray for, when we pray to Guru. |
|
|
| Mango king |
[Aug. 8th, 2008|11:27 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  drunk | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Har Jeeo Sada Teree Sarnaee - Parbhati Mahala 3 - Prof Surinder Singh | ] |
Mango is king. Mango is queen. Mango is everything, omnipotent and omnipresent at all times in all places.
Mango, Mmmmmm-Mmmmmango.
I like mangos.
Speaking of mangos, I am moving again.
On average, I find I need at least 2 years in a place to settle in. In the mean time I float, not quite rooted, not quite there, a bit of part time refugee, a nit of homeless drifter, even if nominally I'm in a place.
It's interesting to notice all sorts of stuff about myself when I'm placed under pressure. Kind of like a amoeba pressed against two glass plates in a microscope slide, except um, the amoeba would be looking at itself through the microscope. Which is quite unlikely, lacking the requisite eyes, etc.
Whoah. Meta, man. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Jul. 9th, 2008|11:00 pm] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Gobinde Mukande (31 min) - Sada Sat Kaur | ] |
Art. It's a very ephemeral word. Time to stroke that goatee like you were deep in thought.
For the past two months, I have been "getting into the arts scene". Unfortunately for me, that does not mean cocktails, wild bohemian parties with attractive vulnerable young arts students. No. Instead it's a slow process of learning about the bureaucratic intricacies of arts funding, making tentitive contact with other artists, and generally finding out what is going on.
Why?
I believe that Gurmat Sangeet is an artform. Certainly it is not just an artform, but then arguably many artists can claim, with some substance, that their is "not just an artform". Transcendental art, art that takes your breath away and blanks your mind so your soul, for a brief moment, can bask in the shining beauty that is His work, is not just art. It is the very purpose of life itself, to experience the experience of living.
The world exists in polarities. For every black there is a white, every negative a positive. We are forced to daily wade through pain, indifference, ugliness and vileness in every form, projected into our minds by a million posters, rap songs, broadsheets, gossip magazines, news programmes, movies. As we struggle (and as some enjoy wallowing, in ignorance and blindness), we ask, where is the polarity? Where can we find peace and rest, not in the form of what "happiness" should be like, as sold to us by sun drenched adverts of an impossible ideal which we must purchase?
We find it in beauty. In art. In forms that not only heal the ugly wounds of the world, but which also seeks to beautify it. All of it. Every last gasp of suffering joyous miraculous atrocity that make this play of maya what it is.
In art, then, and in the art of the Guru, by the grace of Guru's poetry and music.
Back to funding workshops and networking events. Where I am having difficulty is in deciding what constitutes a true spreading of the message contained in Guru's words, and what constitutes selling out, selling down, prostitution.
Those who know me intimately will recognise that selling out has been a running theme in my life. Indeed, those who are honest, will realise it is an issue in every life. When we prostitute ourselves, we profit like the beggar who breaks his own leg to gain sympathy. Yet when that seems the only option open to us, or when it is much less dramatic, we say it is a "compromise". More insidious, we project the fault onto others, while we remain (in our own minds) spotless. As the saying goes, throw mud at someone, and some of it will stick to you. More, it means you have mud to hand. Where did it come from? Certainly not from the other person.
And yet, how can I contain something I know to be beautiful within the suffocating confines of a religious dogma? I know this has to go out. Guru Nanak played to all. His music reflected and communicated to the people he was with, he adopted their rhythms, their songs, and sang back to them their highest praises of God.
Keeping in mind this, must Gurmat Sangeet only ever appear in a "religious" context, a context defined by other people? Or can it be used in art, if art were repurposed to include the function of elevating our soul to the infinite? |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Jun. 21st, 2008|10:37 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | poem, poetry | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | The sounds around my head, or are they inside my head? | ] |
Sun spots my soul
Black spots to turn and burn
Twisting tighter than a million lives in pain
The release of fire explodes into space
Screaming a desire older than time
The desire to life to live to burn
Through the coldness of despairing emptiness
Shot through with needles of needy greed
We burn, we burn, we burn
Through the night of life to the day of death
This fire dances and flickers, waltzing
With its own shadow
Until the sun spots dark on my soul
Turn and twist and dance no more
We, and thee, and sun, are one |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Jun. 18th, 2008|10:46 pm] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Guru Ram Das (60m) - Mirabai | ] |
After thirty years asleep, you came to me
Through crowded thoughts, song of a soft blue sky
I sought somewhere to hide, away, away
From your eyes, questions unspoken.
Reaching out, you brushed my face
And I turned away, terrified.
I broke my string of longing
I shattered my dream.
And your face - so plain - faded from my mind.
You knew who I am, better than my heart.
But who are you? |
|
|
| navigation |
| [ |
viewing |
| |
most recent entries |
] |
| [ |
go |
| |
earlier |
] |
| |
|
|