Letter 15:
Let the sleeping soul remember...
26/06/07
Everyone,
Hello! How are you? Have you heard of Jorge Manrique, the great Spanish poet? When his father died, he wrote these lines:
Let the sleeping soul remember,
and be awake and be alive
in contemplation
of how our life passes away,
of how our death comes forward to us
so silently
How did we forget the truths in that?
Almost everyone knows that they are truths, however no-one acts like they know. Why is that?
Our souls are asleep. We know that life is transient, and therefore that it is useless to go searching for the pleasures of the world. However, we do not listen to the voice of the soul, which always tells us to search for the profound, the high, up to Eternity, within our own hearts, and instead of this, we carry on searching for worldly pleasures, like brutes.
We are in the habit of continuing to do the things that we do every day, like machines. We do not see out of our own little world, we never contemplate that which is beyond with longing and real sincerity, and so life passes us by, and death comes forward to us without us even realising before it is too late. We must wake up and be alive, but do so in truth, not just in words, and right now, for our death comes forward to us so silently that we never have any idea when it could arrive, unless we are dying already. As the Tibetans say, "tomorrow or the next life; which comes first, we never know".
Real spiritual potential appears when vairagya arises. What is vairagya? It is in part an internal renunciation, and therefore natural and not forced, of attachments to the things of the world. If we always remember intellectually that there is no use in spending energy in searching for worldly things, and that we ought to be searching for spirituality, we have discrimination. If we do not even have the desire to search for worldly things, and the desire to search for spirituality manifests automatically, because of the spiritual bliss that manifests in the heart when the attachments, which block the bliss, are cut, we have vairagya.
Vairagya is attained through contemplation of how our life passes away, of how our death comes forward to us so silently. As Bhagavan says, "the world is a passing phenomenon, nothing more". It is something that simply has to be realised if we want to live, and not just talk, in accordance with our knowledge.
If we consider life, it is illogical to not try to let the sleeping soul remember, and be awake and be alive. After all, where is the beauty in life?
Each time a poem penetrates your heart, or you behold the underlying beauty in a work of art or vista, thereby attaining a deep quietness or pure joy, or follow your heart, letting it guide you to do what it nudges you to as a true romantic, your flower opens a little wider. Something very personal, meaningful on a level that simply cannot be attained out in the world, and impossible to properly express, arises within you. What if, instead of going just a little bit deeper into your heart, you went down to an absolutely tremendous depth? Maybe the heart could not contain it, it would burst, and wave upon wave of inexpressible, hitherto never-encountered feeling from beyond would engulf you, utterly helpless, falling as you would be through a sky of infinity with nothing to grasp at, speared by innumerable rays of mystic pain and ecstasy.
It is these things, the realisations, whose effects are eternal, that truly give real meaning to life. The world is a passing phenomenon, nothing more. How can we not have vairagya?
What is life? It is a journey from brute man to Buddha man. Let us commence the journey by meditating on these lines by Jorge Manrique.
May our paths be swift!
Hare Krishna,
Koji