The Difficulty of a True Spiritual Life

If you think you’re so enlightened, go live with your family for two weeks. - Ram Dass

There seems to be an unconscious misconception that the spiritual life is limited to certain days of the week, perhaps some festivals, or certain specific practices such as meditation, Scripture reading or prayer. I do think that this might be more under the older generations and that the younger generations are increasingly changing their views, with many identifying as Spiritual but not Religious (SBNR). Then again it might just be a bias on my side as the change in views increased rapidly at least since the 1960’s (Ram Dass, who I quote above and who died in late 2019, grew up Jewish but became a Hindu around 1967). Of course, changing one’s views does not necessarily means that one suddenly lives a more spiritual life. What does it mean to live a spiritual life and why do I say this is difficult? The quote by Ram Dass is one of my favourites and one I always try to keep in mind. That is because the spiritual life might start with going to church on a Sunday or mosque on a Friday or personal meditation and prayer rituals in the morning, but after that the question becomes this – If those moments do not become clear in your public life, while you driving, spending time with family or doing your job, then what was it for? The spiritual life becomes difficult the moment you move out of your sacred space and into contact with other human beings (or any other beings for that matter). It is easier to stand with your eyes closed and hands in the air on a Sunday morning than it is to keep calm with traffic on the way home. We don’t even have to take it that far – most of us start gossiping or judging the moment we set foot out of Church (perhaps even while worshipping). It is easy to sit in front of your Scriptures and light a candle or incense stick and feel all tranquil, of course that is if you could leave the warmth of your bed in time, then one gets to work, and you must remember to smile at the annoying co-worker. A true spiritual life will be an important part of every decision you make, of every action taken, of every word said. It might not be possible to absolutely control your thoughts but what your reaction with your thoughts is should tell you something – do you stop it, or do you entertain it? “If your religion does not change you then you should change your religion,” said Elbert Hubbard. Rabbi Hillel is reported to have said that the Golden Rule (Do not do unto others that which you would not like them to do unto you) is the whole spiritual practice and that the rest of what we read and believe is only commentary on this rule. In other words, if you pray or do any kind of spiritual practice and you believe that what you believe is the only truth, but you give in to every desire and let your ego reign supreme with no compassion for most other people, then you have not even begun to live a spiritual life. All this can sound very discouraging, but honestly, I am trying to encourage you to pull up your socks and get serious, whatever your chosen path might be. That does not mean there can be no fun in life, but it does mean that we pay attention to how we are having fun. It is going to be difficult; you are going to fail on an almost daily basis. At the same time the alternative is to live an unexamined life and that, said Socrates, is not a life worth living. Fulfilment comes when we are constantly working on ourselves. “I want happiness” said someone to a Buddhist monk, “Take away ‘I’ as that is the ego, take away ‘want’ as that is desire and what is left is ‘happiness’”, answered the monk. Now that we are parents, my wife regularly says, “You know what, we should just forgive our parents”. There was a time that I was angry with my dad on an almost daily basis, and it did not help that he was a pastor. Then I became a dad, never mind the fact that I became a husband, and I realised that I must always watch myself. The moment I cannot answer in a soft manner, I cause hurt. The moment I react in an irritable manner, I cause hurt. Sitting down to meditate or pray after that makes me feel ashamed, so much so that I sometimes feel that perhaps it is better to just give up. I know, however, that the moment I stop working on myself I will do even worse. I hope and pray that, if I stay on living a true spiritual life, as difficult as it may be, one day my children will be able to forgive me. Rabbi Hillel ends his declaration on the Golden Rule with these words: “Now go study”. Whatever religion, spiritual part, or philosophy you follow – study hard and then act in compassion. I encourage you. May the One God, with many Names and many Manifestations, bless you.

Transformation Process from Omnivore to Vegan: Part 2

In the previous part I explained environmental, health and humane reasons for going vegan. I am on this journey to give up my addiction to meat and all other animal products because I truly believe that we do not need meat in our diet and that what we are doing to the animals we would not even wish on our worst enemies. What I did not explain in the previous part was the spiritual reasons for going vegan although I did mention that looking after the environment and having compassion on all living beings are already very spiritual things to do. Whatever the case may be, here follows more specific spiritual reasons.

Two of the comments I received on the previous part is relevant for this part. The first comment was that the person hears what I am saying but to give up meat would be too difficult. The other comment was a reference to the Bible which say that those who eat only vegetables are weak. So, the first comment reminded me that every person are on their own journey and that no matter how much we point out cruelty towards others or unhealthy practices towards ourselves, writing here is only the hopeful seed of positive influence. The second comment is a reminder that people read the Bible (and many other Holy Scriptures) out of the context within which it was written and will grab at single verses which they think support their arguments without taking the whole of the chapter in consideration. Let us then start with this chapter which is Romans 14.

There are two things to remember when reading Romans 14 and that is, first of all, that Christians in the ancient world were still a minority and that the meat in those times were offered to idols before it was being sold (today Christianity are the largest religion with more that 2billion people professing to be Christian) and, secondly, Romans 14 is not primarily about food but about faith. In other words, when Paul writes in verse two that the person who is weak only eat vegetables he means to say that there is only One God and thus if you are worried about the meat because of the false gods then you do not need to worry because there is no other gods, false or otherwise, besides God only; however, if your faith is weak (thus, if you still feel that there is false gods to be worried about) then eat only vegetables. He then says it does not matter because those who eat meat should not look down on those who does not and those who eats only vegetables should not judge those who eat meat (one of the things that I made clear in the previous part was that I understand all of us are on our own journeys, I do not judge, but that I want to put this out there as positive influence).

Paul then continues to explain the same principle about faith with regards to the days of the week: some say Sunday (or the Sabbath) is holy but God made all days and we should live holy on all days. That is the context of this chapter and in the end, it had nothing to do with veganism and meat eating to begin with. People who only eat vegetables, vegetarians or vegans, are not weak. In fact, I challenge any meat eater to go without meat for a month (I suggest October as that is World Vegetarian Month) and see if it is easy, I assure you that you will have new respect for the strength those who do not eat meat.

It is true that Jesus ate meat, but that cannot be used as an excuse anymore than the fact that the Dalai Lama eats meat. As the Dalai Lama has his specific reasons while still advocating that a vegetarian diet is better so Jesus was living in times when veganism was not the social issue it is today. The reasons for this are simple, right in the beginning God gave the plants to humans as food and they only started eating meat after Noah and the great flood, thus after sin entered the world according to the Christian worldview. Why then did Moses allow it in the law? This is the same kind of question the Pharisees asked Jesus and his answer were: “Due to the hardness of your hearts”. This hardness of our hearts is a problem even today, we do understand the reasons why it is wrong to kill animals when there is more than enough food to end famine, we understand that we are cruel, we try to justify it by playing with words; and all this because we insist on our desires, entertainment, power and financial gain.

I have realized this cruelty within myself and decided to face up to it. We are not only cruel to each other, but also to millions of other species (more than 680 species are extinct as a direct result of human activities and more than 1 million are under threat) and to the planet itself. This lead me to realize that we need a lot more compassion as it is explained by the Buddhists and love as it is written in the Christian Scriptures (I will write more about what exactly it means to love in a later post). Compassion is to understand that when we look pass everything that divide us, including race, age, religion, nationality, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, politics, species and anything else, there is the Spark of God within all of life. Our interconnectedness, the African philosophy of Ubuntu expanded to include far more than only humanity but to be universal, lead us to realize that if we act hurtful to anything – no matter how small it seems to us – we act hurtful to everything and that have repercussions for the future. It is only compassion which will make us care about a future where we ourselves might not be and yet live on.

Unless ye must, bruise not the serpent in the dust, how much less wound a man. And if ye can, no ant should ye alarm, much less a brother harm.

Abdu’l-Baha

Compassion, in the end, is to always be loving because we know we are not the only ones with problems. It is to always be loving towards everyone and everything, from the most innocent to those who we are sure do not deserve it. There are few things more innocent than an animal that does not understand why it is being hunted to be killed or herded to be slaughtered and yet experience that fear of what is happening. It is easy to look down on animals as creatures we can do with as we please, but ask yourself these two questions – If it is okay for us to kill for food (and buying your meat in packages in the local supermarket is indirectly condoning the killing), why do we experience it as cruel when a tiger or lion kills a human? If cannibalism is wrong because it is murder and, also, that there is enough other food; why then is it okay for us to eat the flesh of other beings?

I sincerely hope, indeed pray, that we will gradually start to live in greater awareness of our actions, that we will ask ourselves if what we are busy with every second of the day is compassionate. Further, that it will not stay with awareness but that we will take action and make better decisions within our own environments and within our own spheres of influence.

May the One God with many Names and many Manifestations, bless you

How Adhering to the Rules of the Road can be Spiritual

This morning while driving to work I was astonished, for the umpteenth time, at the number of motorists driving in the yellow lane at the side of the road and at the number of motorists speeding. This is nothing new on South African roads. It is part of a list of road rules that are being ignored, almost as a rule of thumb. It is, for instance, also not unusual to see a vehicle stop in the middle of the road in order to have a conversation with someone walking next to the road while the rest of the vehicles have to try and drive around that. There is even a joke about speeding:

"What is the speed limit on South African roads?

R100"

I guess that most of you will think this is mostly applicable to taxis. I can understand taxis though. Don't get me wrong - I'm not condoning their behaviour and I would like to see them disciplined severely. However, due to a lack of a solution to the "taxi problem", I think many of us are so use to them that we are always on the lookout for them in order to be safe. Some important things I learned regarding taxis:

• Never fight a taxi. If a taxi want to pass you in order to speed or drive in the yellow lane or whatever other rule to break - just let them. It's much safer that way. Remember a taxi does not care about his vehicle, or yours for that matter, and won't try to avoid scratching you.
• Never curse a taxi. Honestly they do not care. All you are succeeding in is to push your own blood pressure up. "Like water from the back of a duck" does not even closely say how much they don't care about your curses.
• Never get into a shouting match with a taxi or try to physically attack them. Apart from this being not spiritual at all, it is plain right stupid. They have to make only one phone call and the whole universe of taxis will surround you... Who ya gonna call?

The problem is that taxis are not even the main problem. So we are used to them not following the rules. What's flabbergasting is all the other vehicles acting in league with the taxis, mimicking them. It is to them who I address this (because taxis won't listen anyway and I hope the rest of the bad drivers still have something of a conscience).

There are some reasons anyone can think of about why the rules of the road should be followed. Especially the two I am focusing on. One is obviously that it is the law... When we think of criminals we immediately think about thieves, murderers, burglars and so forth. The fact that you drive in the yellow lane or drive over the speed limit means that you are also a criminal. Look, I understand that you are late for work and that you have to get there as soon as possible or else you have to explain to your boss... but, when the traffic is thick, so will the rest of us. Don't be a criminal and let's manoeuvre the traffic together.

Another obvious reason is the danger factor. Especially with speeding - there is so much happening on the road and not everybody are as aware. Think of how many people are on their cell phones while driving (which is also against the law by the way for those odd ones who didn't know) or busy thinking about the day ahead or the fight with the wife last night instead of focusing on the road. Add to that the fact that you are driving 180km/h in a 120km/h zone... We see so many road accidents and will, ironically, slow down to see what happened just to speed up right after that again not sparing a single thought that perhaps it was the speeding that killed.

One last reason I want to mention (but there is much more) is especially for the yellow lane drivers. You might get to the front of the line much quicker but the moment you want to return to the actual lane where you are supposed to drive, you slow everyone else down even more. But, because you got to your destination quicker, what do you care, right?

But that is exactly it. What does all this have to do with spirituality? Personally I believe that spirituality is not just going to church on a Sunday or going to the Mosque or Synagogue on a Friday or Saturday. Spirituality is not just about visiting temples or other holy places, about meditating and praying and reading the Scriptures. Spirituality is also what you do after you did all those things. Actually spirituality is changing yourself on the inside and then acting it out into the real world. If you are serious about your spiritual life than you should know that life as a whole is supposed to be an act of worship. Kindness, compassion and love should shine in absolutely everything you do. The world will not be changed by famous people doing big and awesome things but by normal people doing small things out of love for their fellow human beings, all other beings and nature itself.

Caring, then, starts with yourself and can be acted out in something as mundane as driving on the way to work (or wherever else you are heading). Let's start with the more obvious one - speeding. In many cases a law was implemented with a specific reason (I'm sure there is some that are not, but that's besides the point at the moment). The speed limit were not implemented in order to keep you from reaching your destination in time (time management is your responsibility, not that of your government). It is there precisely because death may occur when two vehicles collide (Yes there might be other, less virtuous reasons, but again - besides the point). Loving yourself should be enough motivation to drive within the speed limit, not to talk about the danger in which you put others. Loving others, and realising that if you cause an accident you will be hurting them, is a basic point in the fact that we are all interconnected.

"The moment you understand the importance of loving yourself,

you will stop hurting others."

Now as for yellow lane driving. In a strange way a person who speeds and a person who drive in the yellow lane are equally guilty when there is an accident. To understand why we need to understand the reason for the existence of the yellow lane to begin with. When you are in an accident you would surely hope that the ambulance arrive at the scene as soon as possible. With a big traffic situation the yellow lane is exactly for this purpose. Now if there is bumper to bumper traffic, perhaps because you were in an accident, and many people decide to skip ahead by driving in the yellow lane then that means that the ambulance will also have to drive slower as it cannot make full use of the lane. And here's the connection between the guilt of a yellow lane driver and the one who caused the accident through speeding - if you are the one driving in the yellow lane, then you are the one obstructing the way for the ambulance. Someone else might die because you wanted to get ahead quicker.

The meaning of the words "love your neighbour as yourself" means much more than just taking some food to a homeless person whenever the need to feel good hits you. It is phrase that should be present within every interaction, directly or indirectly, with others.

Drive safely

and may the One God with many Names and many Manifestations bless you