THOUGHTS ON: Siddhartha and the spiritual journey

Worth the accolades it has received over the years, Hermann Hesse's Siddhartha is a judicious reminder that you need to find your own way spiritually. I love that Siddharta’s Holy Om is almost tangible; you can feel the inner peace emanating from the pages.

"Was not then the source within his own heart? One must find the source within one's own Self, one must possess it. Everything else was seeking - a detour, error."

"When all the Self was conquered and dead, when all passions and desires were silent, then the last must awaken, the innermost of Being that is no longer Self - the great secret!"

But while every individual learns his own way, we can draw from Siddhartha's methods. He learns from experiences, life, teachers and himself and his spiritual journey encompasses the mind, the flesh and transcendence. He finds his individual way, but also that he is part of something bigger - he discovers the unity of all things; that he is in everything and everything is in him.

SM

THOUGHTS ON: The Little Prince, life and integrity

Everywhere I go this week I see Antoine de Saint-Exupery's The Little Prince. At the gym I see a girl wearing a hand-made t-shirt emblazoned with the quote "what is essential is invisible to the eye", on a tv show someone reads the book to their mother who is in a coma, a pile of Little Princes lie on the front counter at my local book store, someone reads a copy on a train. Just a coincidence? Perhaps. But it is worthwhile contemplating the messages within this much-loved book.
Take that quote "what is essential is invisible to the eye". These days superficiality is king (or queen). We seem to value what we look like above everything else. Plastic surgery is on the increase - people go under the surgeon's knife in a quest for beauty or youth, or pay hundreds of dollars for products promising the same; social value is gauged by how many 'friends' you have on a MySpace page; we live in an era where what you look like can make you famous; and indeed we value and strive for fame itself.
Have we lost focus on what is important? How beautiful it is to be wise, have integrity, be a caring and kind person, even make people laugh. It's an old but true adage that we need to be reminded of, and if that is what the universe is trying to tell me this week then that's truly wonderful.

SM

THOUGHTS ON: The Monk who Sold his Ferrari and practical discipline

It is the fact that Robin Sharma's The Monk who sold his Ferrari is so practical that is its biggest recommendation. So often philosophical novels can be esoteric and inaccessible. This novel is practical in its spirituality and so is accessible by anyone.
Don't get me wrong. Sometimes doing your own thinking while reading a novel can mean you get the best, and most relevant, life relevations. But at times reading a book can be a case of yearning for practical suggestions. This is where The Monk who Sold his Ferrari excels.
This book highlights the importance of discipline. Instead of floating through life, meditating in response to feeling bad, for instance, this book recommends getting up with the sun, at the same time every day to meditate and think of all the things for which we can be grateful (among other recommendations). It's about cultivating peace and positive thought - as a lifestyle, not a response.
For the experienced, reading this book can be a mere reminder of what you know. But so few of us live truly enlightened lives, so reminders should be welcomed. But while there is a lot of well-known philosophies here that have been moulded into a practical guide to finding a peaceful inner life, there is also originality among the reminders. Using a sumo wrestler as a metaphor certainly stands out, for one ;)

SM

THOUGHTS ON: For One More Day and regret

The regret is palpable in Mitch Albom's latest book For One More Day. Chick, the main character, regrets how he acted in his relationship with his mother, but is unable to make amends since she is dead. After her death he divorced his wife, became an alcoholic and is ostracized by his daughter. When he attempts suicide he gets a chance to fix past wrongs with his mother. It's a chance many of us would like, but often don't get the opportunity to take. We have to resort to other methods of fixing wrongs. But regret can be overwhelming.
In his book And Never Stop Dancing: Thirty More True Things you need to know now, Gordon Livingston suggests that it is therapeutic to write your memoirs if you forgive of yourself for past wrongs (and unfulfilled dreams) in the process. They don't even really need to be 'wrongs' as such, just actions or words you regret, etc. So often, these wrongs or regrets only happen in our own heads. It is there where we are more harsh on ourselves than we are on other people, and this impedes our current lives.
Serendipitously, someone emailed me this anonymous poem this week:

Yesterday is history.
Tomorrow a mystery.
Today is a gift.
That's why it's called the present.

Albom's book reminded me that we can't let regret impede on the present. The present is valuable.

SM

THOUGHTS ON: Ishmael and longevity of life and world

I am surprised that the book Ishmael: An Adventure in Mind and Spirit hasn't crossed my reading path before now. It is an important book with concepts that are imperative to the world's longevity.
This book is peppered with so many lightbulb moments, but the most important one for me was the explanation about why most of the world seems aware of the fact that we have embarked on systematic destruction of the earth, but that it doesn't seem to amount to any serious action. Unbelievable but true. We just continue on, more or less happy to plunder it of its resources. And in some cases even denying that problems like global climate change/warming exist.
The most interesting point in the book for me is the proposition that we have interfered with evolution - somehow coming to the conclusion that we are the 'end' of the evolutional journey - which has given rise to massive population explosion that the world cannot support, for one, but the worst thing is that the 'civilised' part of the world's population wants more than it needs - this not only applies to food, but the insatiable 'hunger' of an incredible consumerist and throw-away mind-set. We think we need it to be happy, but there is much more mental illness in 'civilised' society than in other societal groups.
While reading it I was reminded of this quote by US journalist Ellen Goodman:
"Normal is getting dressed in clothes that you buy for work and driving through traffic in a car that you are still paying for - in order to get to the job you need to pay for the clothes and the car, and the house you leave vacant all day so you can afford to live in it."
Why do we think it's so important to have the right to live such futile lives?

SM

THOUGHTS ON: Villa Incognito, Gwen Stefani and deaf frogs

While reading Tom Robbins' 2003 book Villa Incognito, one of the many pithy quotes stood out. Like many lightbulb-above-head events we get from fiction that is philosophical, it was illuminating because it resonated with a life experience.
The quote: "Self-importance and self-doubt are usually interchangeable."
I think it's amazing that when you decide to step out and try something new - in effect overcoming fears of failure and the like - that there is a chorus of self-important people ready to fire their negative comments your way. I'm not sure why people spend ANY of their precious life time being negative about others, but I am sure that their own insecurities are integral to their actions. It is easier to criticize others than to step out yourself. For a very small moment, the downcrier feels better than the individual they are firing negativity at, but it is short-lived, self-doubt returns, and the negativity thrower needs to look elsewhere for a self-importance hit.
(Robbins himself must have stepped out at one point - since his unique, very quirky books are not your everyday fiction.)
The Tom Robbins book isn't the only place I got enlightenment from on this issue. I'm not sure why, but often you send out a question or a dilemma to the universe and it delivers on several fronts.
Someone forwarded me one of those light and frothy emails that you usually just bin, but for some reason I read it. Long story short, lots of frogs are climbing a big mountain and lots of people are standing at the bottom saying they'll never make it to the top. One by one the frogs stop climbing the mountain, believing the negativity emanating from the naysayers. Only one frog keeps climbing. He makes it to the top despite the loud unbelievers. Turns out the victorious frog is deaf.
But, well, you don't have to be deaf to step out, pursue your goals, do what you want to do -
And so when I also heard that Gwen Stefani song "What are you Waiting For?" this week, it resonated -
Stuck in a moving car
A scary conversation, shut my eyes, can't find the brake
What if they say that you're a climber
Naturally, I'm worried if I do it alone
Who really cares, cause it's your life
You never know, it could be great

SM

THOUGHTS ON: Even Cowgirls Get the Blues and anti-terrorist laws

Tom Robbins' book Even Cowgirls Get the Blues may have been written in 1976 but boy he hits a bull's-eye with relevancy. Half way through the book, there it was - a metaphorical silver bullet for the current Western governments of the world.

To paraphrase the Chink (slightly mad-yet-wise Japanese (yes Japanese) recluse in the book): He says civilized man has confused stability with rigidity; stabilization to the world's leaders means order, uniformity, control. Disorder invariably leaks in and the world's managers rush to tighten controls and so totalitarianism grows in viciousness and scope. But, the Chink (via Mr. Robbins) alleges, true stability is when order and disorder are balanced. He says a truly stable system expects the unexpected, is prepared to be disrupted, waits to be transformed ... just like how a stable individual is an individual who accepts the inevitability of his death.

Stability doesn't come from effectively taking freedom away from people - by promoting fear and introducing laws to control the masses. At the base of current events is instability in the form of insurgent ideas and terrorism. Governments are attempting to eradicate this instability by introducing draconian laws that in effect only lie like a sheet too small for a bed; it will never cover it sufficiently.

SM

THOUGHTS ON: The Valkyries - and expecting everything

It seems everything I read of late has the same message - expect everything. The idea is that if you expect everything in life nothing that happens is a surprise and you are not left feeling duped or that life is unfair. Once you expect things, they lose half their power. Besides, as we discover in hindsight, often there was no need to worry at all. (Though the lesson is rarely learnt!)

At the end of Paulo Coelho's unusual book The Valkyries, he says we can have all the resources to deal with anything that happens. It seems preparation and this all-encompassing expectation can be a powerful duo. In any case, it's obvious that a whole gamut of experiences, good and bad, happen to everyone so it's no use wanting only good things — And, equally negatively, perhaps feeling like you are in some way responsible for the bad when it happens. Stating the obvious? Maybe. But this was something I, for one, needed to remind myself about.

This was part of the main message I drew from the book. It was about breaking your pact with defeat. My reading was that as individuals we can believe we are 'defeated'. I.e. we expect failure for ourselves. We tell ourselves "nothing ever works out for me", "things go great for a while and then it all falls in a heap."

Anyway so I thought the idea of breaking this - or breaking our pact with defeat - was a powerful one. Though, I'm unsure how it is possible, other than attempting to stop the negative thoughts/ negative self-talk. If anyone has read The Valkyries they will understand why I wouldn't want to undergo the methods used there.
It seemed a bit extreme!! It was a very ritualistic and magic-based approach.

The book is an excellent read though. It features desert-dwelling motor-bike riding religious women — who are either mad or wise; I can't decide (but do we call 'mad' what we are unfamiliar with?). Coelho talks in third person about himself and his partner Chris and their visit to the Californian desert to try to discover/communicate with their angels. With some interesting/amazing results.

SM

THOUGHTS ON: Five People you meet in Heaven & Man's Search for Meaning

I know these two books seem an odd combination, but I read them both in the space of a few days and there was one distinct parallel. This is unusual, of course, as Dr Victor Frankl wrote Man's Search for Meaning decades ago, in the light of his experiences in World War II concentration camps, and Five People You Meet in Heaven is Mitch Albom's latest work of fiction (Albom being the author of the lauded Tuesdays With Morrie).
Yet both books emphasize as part of their stated philosophies the importance of love for one distinct person in your life when extracting meaning from life ... even if that person is no longer alive.
In Albom's book the main character, Eddie, is angry at his wife for dying so young. When she is one of the five people he meets in heaven, his wife Marguerite teaches him that, "Lost love is still love. It takes a different form. You can't see their smile or bring them food or tousle their hair or move them around on the dance floor. But when these senses waken, another heightens. . . . Life has an end. Love doesn't."
In Man's Search for Meaning Frankl talks about the same thing. (At the time of this extract he was being marched to forced labor)
We stumbled on in the darkness, over big stones and through large puddles, along the one road running through the camp. The accompanying guards kept shouting at us and driving us with the butts of their rifles. Anyone with very sore feet supported himself on his neighbor's arm. Hardly a word was spoken; the icy wind did not encourage talk. Hiding his hand behind his upturned collar, the man marching next to me whispered suddenly: "If our wives could see us now! I do hope they are better off in their camps and don't know what is happening to us."
That brought thoughts of my own wife to mind. And as we stumbled on for miles, slipping on icy spots, supporting each other time and again, dragging one another on and upward, nothing was said, but we both knew: each of us was thinking of his wife. Occasionally I looked at the sky, where the stars were fading and the pink light of the morning was beginning to spread behind a dark bank of clouds. But my mind clung to my wife's image, imagining it with an uncanny acuteness. I heard her answering me, saw her smile, her frank and encouraging look. Real or not, her look then was more luminous than the sun which was beginning to rise.
A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth--that love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of man is through love and in love. I understood how a man who has nothing left in this world may still know bliss, be it only for a brief moment, in the contemplation of his beloved. In a position of utter desolation, when a man cannot express himself in positive action, when his only achievement may consist in enduring his sufferings in the right way--an honorable way--in such a position man can, through loving contemplation of the image he carries of his beloved, achieve fulfillment. For the first time in my life, I was able to understand the words, "The angels are lost in perpetual contemplation of an infinite glory."
In front of me a man stumbled and those following him fell on top of him. The guard rushed over and used his whip on them all. Thus my thoughts were interrupted for a few minutes. But soon my soul found its way back from the prisoners existence to another world, and I resumed talk with my loved one: I asked her questions, and she answered; she questioned me in return, and I answered...
My mind still clung to the image of my wife. A thought crossed my mind: I didn't even know if she were still alive, and I had no means of finding out (during all my prison life there was no outgoing or incoming mail); but at that moment it ceased to matter. There was no need to know; nothing could touch the strength of my love, and the thoughts of my beloved. Had I known then that my wife was dead, I think that I still would have given myself, undisturbed by that knowledge, to the contemplation of that image, and that my mental conversation with her would have been just as vivid and just as satisfying. "Set me like a seal upon thy heart, love is as strong as death."

SM