basic reflections

The Way Of Love - Anthony de Mello

“If you wish to love you must learn to see again.”

The sentence could have come straight out of a Krishnamurti reader but that was not where I found it. I’ve been reading this book which Dwight gave me just before returning to Canada. It is called "The Way Of Love",  a collection of last meditations written by Anthony de Mello just before he died. You wouldn't expect a Jesuit priest to be quite as iconoclastic as Tony de Mello  (as his colleagues referred to him), is, yet the wisdom contained in  "The Way  Of Love" is like something straight out of  Tao or Zen or Sufi literature.And why shouldn’t it be! Innate human wisdom is not something which is copyrighted and which only a few select teachers or writers have a right to express.

What sets Anthony De Mello apart from most spiritual leaders is this. Most gurus, regardless of which religion or sect they owe their allegiance to, are not only blatantly full of themselves, but love to tell you how it is in life and what you should do. A lot of their “gyan” is nothing more than the imparting of rules and regulations, of do’s and don’ts which further enslave you. Anthony De Mello, incidentally best known for his inspiring compilation of folk wisdom and stories related to enlightenment, “The Prayer Of The Frog”,  has none of the regular do’s and don’ts to offer. At least in “The Way Of Love” there is not much to identify him as a Catholic priest. What he emphasizes throughout, is the importance of learning to “see.” It is the one thing we avoid in life, he says, preferring as we do, to live with our illusions and our attachments in spite of the fact that they cause us endless suffering.

Why is it so important to open our eyes and see? The logic is simple. When you open your eyes you see things the way they are. You see them in their place, so to speak. You see the place of love, in this whole phenomenon we call “life” and you realize that life without love is not only not worth much, it is inconceivable. It is akin to a flower which refuses to open out and bloom. At some level we all know this and whether or not we are aware of it, are in search of what we call “love”. But in the absence of awareness we are not even in a position to know what love is. We want desperately to be loved without ourselves being really capable of it. What we call love in hindsight turns out only to be greed, possessiveness and insecurity in disguise.

The reason we cannot love, De Mello says, is because we cannot and do not want “to see.” And of course, the “seeing” he refers to, is something which goes far beyond the physical or intellectual understanding we normally connect it with. Seeing in this context, has an immediacy to it and is necessarily untainted by our conditioning, by our prejudices and other concocted notions. Since most of us live within the cells of our own conditioning we are blind to actual reality.

We may think we love someone for example, but if we don’t see them as they are, how can we possibly love them, argues De Mello. Because most of the time, what you think you love, is nothing more than an image, a pretty picture you carry in your head about the person or thing you love. It is a sobering thought, he goes on to say, that the finest act of love you can perform, is not an act of service but an act of contemplation, of seeing. “When you serve people you help, support, comfort, alleviate pain. When you see them in their inner beauty and goodness you transform and create.” Not only does the act of seeing give birth to love, but it helps us to live in the moment – which is really the same thing.

Is this why, in spite of there being so many social workers in the world and so many institutions dedicated to helping mankind, real transformation seems out of reach? Because so many of us are doing “good work” to appease our conscience, to ensure a place in heaven when we die (or if you happen to be a Hindu and believe in reincarnation, to ensure that all goes well in the next lifetime). Or do the good deeds come out of the same greed and ambition which powers most people in the world of business or politics though in a different context? Or do we do what we do to take the edge off our boredom or anxiety, and not because we genuinely “see” what the right thing is, to do?

“Think of the terror that comes to a rich man when he sets out to really see the pitiful condition of the poor,” says De Mello, “to a power-hungry dictator when he really looks at the plight of the people he oppresses, to a fanatic, a bigot, when he really sees the falsehood of his convictions when they do not fit the facts.”

This terror, according to De Mello has to do with the destruction of the valued illusions and images which make up our world and on which our lives are based. “That is why the most painful act the human being can perform, the act that he dreads the most is the act of seeing.”

But it is in the very act of seeing that love is born, De Mello tells us, or to put it more accurately, “that act of seeing is Love.”

 

Uma

 

 

 

 

 

You are Beauty

You are Beauty - Krishnamurti applied in daily life  by Samuel Widmer, is a rare book which is bound to interest students and admirers of the Indian philosopher and spiritual master,  J.Krishnamurti’s works as well as those interested in going beyond their own  conditioned mindsets.

This book not only makes it easier for one  to understand the relevance of  Krishnamurti’s teachings in ones own life but is paradoxically,  a book which makes the master’s philosophy accessible to the layman through Widmer’s very lucid use of language.

To start with, Samuel Widmer, a psychiatrist and psychotherapist based in Switzerland, and spiritual guide to many, explains the relationship between therapy and spirituality and also, how he himself happened to get interested in Krishnamurti’s teachings.

Normal psychology according to Widmer, is concerned with what is sick and is consequently, interested only in a re-conditioning of the brain. My psychology, he continues, feels responsible for the totality of man and also for a renewal of society.

Questions to reflect on:

What is the meaning of suffering?

Is it possible to live without fear?

Is it possible to live in a conflict free society?

Copies can be ordered from Sharat: sharatsingh@yahooo.com

 

 

Quick Fix To Life's Problems?

A Fable About Fulfilling Your Dreams & Reaching Your Destiny?

Yeah sure – if your destiny is to live behind a cardboard mask.

At last I know why the book entitled “The monk who sold his Ferrari” has been on the best seller list for a while. I had once flipped through it briefly at a friend’s place and the little I did read hadn’t exactly encouraged me to delve further, but I had not given it much thought at the time. Now at least I know why I was never really attracted to it – why I never thought of buying or reading it, in spite of the fact that it comes with a strong recommendation from big time guys like  Paulo Coelho, author of “The Alchemist” (now that  is a truly charming tale about life and dreams and destiny, if ever there was one.)

Yesterday’s papers (forget which one) carried a paragraph on Robin Sharma’s book, one line of which gave me the gist of the whole thing.

“Fake it to make it,” says the bloke. In other words start with something fake and you end up with something real. Hmmmm. I can see how a whole lot of people would simply LOVE that sort of thing. Love the ease with which they are made to feel they can get over something like a  depression in the time it takes to drink a Red Bull. I mean he makes it sound  almost as easy as swallowing a pill.

Put a smile on your face when you’re feeling depressed, is apparently his advice to us. If you walk with your head hanging low you’ll feel more depressed. (OK, I can see that part of it). So smile even if you’re feeling bad, and keep smiling (and smiling... GO ON!)  and somewhere that smile becomes real.

Heh? Really? Any of you actually tried that one? Sounds more like you paste a smile on your face and then forget you pasted it there. Eventually you forget you’re walking around with a mask covering your actual features and you start looking like one of those ghouls who walk around with their faces perpetually frozen into a smiling mask. I’ve seen a few and I don’t know if they’re naturals or whether they too started looking like that after reading some quick fix author.

I am not saying that depression is good or that it is more real than happiness. What I think is, it happens in life. You feel depressed. You would have to be some kind of an unfeeling robot not to ever feel depressed about some of the things that happen to you or say, about the state of the world. At the same time, feelings come and go. Sometimes they last a while and sometimes they’re gone before you know it. Mostly they disappear when you’re able to simply see and accept them for what they are. And at least as far as I’m concerned,  pasting a grin on your face when you’re feeling low is to try and not feel what you are feeling at that point. It’s a superficial solution to a difficult situation and as such, a temporary one.

So if you have the patience and the will, go for the real thing. Acknowledge the depression and if it gets too much for you,  go see a counsellor or a psychotherapist. If you already know what it’s about and it’s something you can deal with, just put up with it like you would a cold or a headache. It will pass and you won’t have to stagger around with a cardboard cut out propped up front of you all your life,  as some people do, to convince the world that  that is the real you. (If you’re able to deal with it you don’t need me, anyhow, to tell you that!)

And if you want a real book to read,  go for J.Krishnamurti’s dialogues. Or Alan Watts maybe. Or any of a number of authors who don’t recommend short cuts but rather, help you to cope with reality without having to fake it.  Or if there is some point I’ve missed about Robin Sharma’s book on account of that one line (and those couple of minutes of flipping through it) on whose basis I am of course judging it, write in and let me know. There is still room for a second opinion.

Uma