Born Again
It’s always amusing to me how quickly my mind will slip back into “theist” mode. After years of being fed nonsense ideas about gurus and gods my mental faculty had dulled up a bit…
I’m in distress. Something has happened. Some outside threat. Maybe financial, maybe relationships, kids or a health issue… All of a sudden I see my mind scrambling in the darkness towards the one thing that has never helped in any authentic way or given and real balance or vividness to the traumatic experience at hand: God. Yet the mind rushes to it with directness and pleads, “This time I will worship you oh God, I will follow your servants and representatives—please show me the way, remove these obstacles and guide me…hare krishna, hare krishna…”
It took me years to rid my mind of this crippled thinking and rely on my life experience and intuition to guide me through tough patches. Sure, there was drugs at times and other distractions to float me through it when I was still discovering my own way to think through life’s challenges (and reformat the hard drive so-to-speak). But the feeling of liberation—of mental freedom—that occurs when you purge these lingering ideas of a “protector” looking out for me. It was actually in and of itself very protective and healing. It’s actually akin to the feeling of surrender that spiritual paths speak of—but without surrendering to something that is figment of the imagination—to a construct of the weak mind.
Walking in the dark forest I think of how many times I’ve been here before. And how many times I’ve made it through—with nothing going wrong. Trusting the darkness and my sure footing to reveal what’s there: A rock, slippery mud, a cliff, spider webs, an animal lurking…
It’s as if the very concept of some “protective god” actually generates fear that was not there to begin with. When we’re in the womb, when we’re barely born—do we fear in the way that we fear now? No. Of course not. We have no concept of what constitutes and actual threat. And isn’t it ironic that as life goes on, we end up filling our minds with so many fears all surrounding the very thing that is seemingly meant to give us solace?
When I think of god now I thing of all the things I was taught to fear: Questioning the guru, the scriptures, fearing hell, fearing heaven, fearing sense enjoyment, fearing “materialists” and “karmis”, fearing those who where on the same path but had different guru’s, fearing not doing the rituals properly, fearing that I was too impure, fearing that my parents were going to judge me, fear of homosexuals, other religions, women, sex, music, and just about fucking everything for that matter…
For a religion that professes love and devotion we were basically programmed to be mildly petrified and disgusted with the world around us. No wonder the dark, harmless forest of life seemed so daunting/threatening when we finally freed our minds. No longer was Narasingha Dev, Hanuman, our guru and the holy name going to save us from all the unknowns… we were, as we arrived in this world… still alone…and it was ok… in fact it was perfect.
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At least we know he's cool 