January 10th, 2010

Dear Friends,

Chanting makes my happy, and that is why I chant.  I do not seek enlightenment.  I do not worship any gods or goddesses.  But I know that chanting makes me happy.  Whether I chant in Sanskrit or English, whether I chant the names of gods, or the names of my friends, chanting makes me happy.  I think if I chanted in Pig Latin, it would make me happy.  And I think to be happy is worthy goal, one which I understand, one which seems within my reach.  And above all, chanting is something I can share with my friends.  And that is probably why it makes me happy.

Kirtan with John and Friends

What - Kirtan with John and Friends at Yoga Shala North Williams
When - First Fridays, 7 to 9 PM (Beginning in February)
Where - Yoga Shala North Williams, 3808 North Williams., Portland
Details - Join us.  We have more fun if you do. By donation

What - Kirtan with Ananda at Yoga Shala North Williams
When - Third Fridays, 7 to 9 PM
Where - Yoga Shala North Williams, 3808 North Williams., Portland
Details - Share the Joy with Janea and Ananda. By donation

Kundalini Yoga and Chanting with Aisha and John

What - Kundalini Yoga and Chanting at Yoga Shala Southeast
When - Tuesdays, 6:30 to 8 PM
Where - Yoga Shala Southeast, 3249 SE Division St., Portland
Details - Join us for this powerful combination of movement and chanting.

What - Kundalini Yoga and Chanting at Yoga Shala Southeast
When - Thursdays, 6:30 to 8 PM
Where - Yoga Shala Southeast, 3249 SE Division St., Portland
Details - Get strong and sink deep into your inner self.

Yoga and Chanting with Aisha, Lenore, and John

What - Vinyasa Yoga and Chanting with Aisha at Yoga Shala North Williams
When - Fridays, 9:30 to 11 AM
Where - Yoga Shala 3808 North Williams Ave., Portland
Details - Vinyasa level two

What - Vinyasa Yoga and Chanting with Lenore Yoga Shala North Williams
When - Saturdays, 4 to 5:15 PM
Where - Yoga Shala 3808 North Williams Ave., Portland
Details - Vinyasa community class all levels

I have a friend who loves music.  And she loves sharing it.  And if you would like to share it with her, go to Prajnaji Sound Collective, where you will find some of funkiest chanting you have ever heard.  My friend wants to remain anonymous, and so she shall.  But trust me when I say she is extremely talented.  And even more important, she is a caring and loving human being who wants the world to be a better place for her presence.

I hope you enjoy these recordings from "Letters to My Friends: A No Guarantees Guide to Awakening."

A Calling

A Small Basketball Shark

Beyond the Need of Concepts

Begin Anew Again

Not long ago, I dreamed a dream while sitting on the side of a mountain near Yachats.  And as I sat, I watched the mists arising from the ocean to the west of me.  I cannot say if I was awake or asleep during this dream.  I only know that when I awoke from it, I had written of the dream as I dreamed it.
   
I looked about me, and I saw a girl, a real girl, one I had met only the day before.  Had she been there all the time?  It did not matter.  I got up and walked to where she sat in the grass.  I bent and kissed her forehead. Her name was Aga. I said in response to her surprised but gentle smile, “Thank you for the gift of that kiss. Someday I will explain.” I am explaining now.
   
Here is the dream.
   
   
When I die, I’m going to face my maker and my maker will say, “John before you return to a state of bliss, account for yourself."
   
And I’m gonna say, “What?”
   
And God’s gonna say, “Account for yourself.”
   
And I’ll say, “No, I heard that. What I want to know is if you really meant I’m going to return to bliss.”
   
And God will say, “You’re dead and your going to return to bliss. Yes, I said that.”
   
And I’ll say, “Bliss? Do you mean bliss as in nirvana, as in enlightenment, as in Samadhi and so on?”
   
And God will say, “Well, these terms are rather meaningless, but yes.”
   
“Do you mean to say that all I needed to do was die and I would have entered into a state of Samadhi?”
   
And God will say, “Yes.”
   
And I will say, “You mean all those years I sat meditating, sitting still, and being holy I was really seeking death?”
   
“Yes,” God will say, “And now that we have that straight, give an accounting of yourself.”

“Hell, no!” I will say. “You give me a accounting of yourself first.”
   
And God’s gonna say, “What?”
   
“You heard me. Now why didn’t you tell me that Samadhi and death are one in the same the same thing? I could have been having a fun. Instead I was spiritual and I had a practice. Good Lord, preserve me! Couldn’t you have at least given me a hint?”

“You didn’t want to think about what death really means. You wanted to manifest abundance. You wanted a fulfilling life. You wanted to be enlightened. You wanted to be healed. John, nobody wants the truth. You didn’t until you got cancer. Then you stripped away your beliefs to nothing. Then you stood alone. And then you looked at the truth. Death is a gift. It is a precious gift, for only through understanding death does life become precious. I gave you plenty of hints.”
   
“When did you give me hints? I don’t remember any hints.”
   
“Remember that time you were in the middle of a field and a bull charged you?”
   
“Sure! How could I forget? There were usually cows in that pasture. I thought I was gonna die.”
   
“You nearly did.”
   
“Yeah, well, I ran so fast I think I singed the grass.”
   
“Do you remember how you felt?”
   
“Yeah, scared. I felt scared. But I was watching myself. Only it wasn’t my normal me watching. And I knew that even if I got trampled, I would be fine. It was as though I had tapped into a pool of infinite compassion.”
   
“Right,” God will say, “that was death you felt. You were so close to death that you jumped back and forth between this reality and Samadhi.”
   
“Damn,” I’ll say.
   
“It’s a little bit of a shock,” God will say. “No matter how hard I try to show people what death is, they run. My oh my, how they run.”
   
“Yeah,” I will agree. “That they do.”
   
“But not you,” God will say. “Not you, at least not lately. You haven’t been afraid. You’ve looked at death and said, ‘Come on. Have at me. I’m ready to die’.”
   
“Yeah, well, God, I’ve changed my mind.”
   
“What? Just yesterday I heard you say, ‘The worse that can happen is I’ll be dead, and hell, I’ve been dead for most of eternity. And it didn’t bother me a bit’. Didn’t I hear you say that?”
   
“Yup, I did say that.”

“And I’m sure I heard you say, ‘No reincarnation. No afterlife. No nothing. Just death. Come on death, I’m not afraid of you’.”
   
“Yeah, I said that too.  I think you took out the swear words, though. In any case, I’ve changed my mind. I’d like a few more days.”
   
“Why?”

“God, I made a mistake.”
   
“And what was that?”
   
“All those years I meditated because I wanted to attain enlightenment, they were wasted. All those years I listened to a teacher repeating what he had heard from his teacher; but had never experienced for himself, they were wasted. All the hours I spent reading all those silly books, they were wasted. I was dumb.”
   
“Dumb?” God will say. “You did what was yours to do.  You loved chanting.  Even now as we speak, are you not chanting to yourself?  You loved meditating in community.  You loved listening to teachers who knew only a little and laughed at how little it was.  You loved reading a good book.  Your error was sometimes doing these things from a sense of obligation.”
   
“That is what I mean!  How often did I act from a sense of obligation instead of joy. There were dogs I should have petted. Instead I meditated because I wanted to attain Nirvana. There were rocks I should have skipped on rivers I have never seen. Instead I listened to spiritual teachers because I wanted wisdom. There were girls I should have kissed. Instead I studied because I feared I would never find the answer.  Petting, skipping, kissing, those should have been my meditations.”
   
“You were seeking death, and all the while it awaited you with gentle arms.”
   
“I want a just a few more days.”

“Why?”
   
“I want to hold my children and give them my courage.  I want to see the gentle smile of my love and tell her that she is Radhe, the one whom I worship.  I want to hug my friends.  I want to smile at strangers.  I want to walk barefoot in the sand. I want to roll in the grass.  I want to kiss a girl!”

“You want your life to be your meditation?”
   
“Yes!” I will shout. “And I don’t want to die with a single ‘I love you’ left in me!”
   
“Do you mean to tell me that you are willing to give up the Enlightenment of Death just to kiss a girl?”
   
“You damn bet I am.”
   
And God will say, “Good choice.”
   
   
Blessings,
   
John C. Conley
   
   
Questioner: What do you think he’s trying to say?”
   
Baba Ram Jahn: Does it matter?
   
Questioner:  That is the wrong question.
   
Baba Ram Jahn: If it is the wrong question, then the answer makes no difference.
   
Questioner: I think we should go skip some rocks.
   
Baba Ram Jahn: Are you saying that enlightenment is to be found in the skipping of rocks on calm waters?
   
Questioner: I am saying I can skip a rock farther, further, and faster than you can!
   
Baba Ram Jahn: You will eat those words, Daughter.  But in a gentle way, of course!  Om.

Dear Friends,

This is a story about a remarkable woman. But like all honest stories, it is about me. I cannot see her outside of my own world, nor should I. I will leave it to others who loved her to tell how she affected them.

Not long ago, a young man came up to me with two friends in tow. He said, “I’m so glad to see you here. I’ve been telling my friends about you. I told them meeting you is like meeting the Buddha.”

My reaction was one of resignation because this sort of thing happens to me fairly often these days. Still, like a favorite poem, my habitual thoughts paraded before me. There was nothing new in these thoughts. However, their ability to reproduce themselves with uncanny accuracy will never cease to amaze me. The human mind is a miracle of repetition, or at least mine is. My first thought is always, “But you don’t really know me!” My second thought is always, “But I don’t want to do this!” My third thought is always, “But what is it I do?”

It is true, those who say I remind them of the Buddha, with a few exceptions, do not know me. They do not see me when I feel confused, sad, angry, arrogant, or dependent. Oftentimes, but not always, when they do get to know me, they are disappointed. We all of us want a hero. I know I do. So I understand their disillusionment. The odd thing is that the more I insist I am not as loving as others sometimes think I am, the less I am believed. When I am accused of being loving, strange thoughts go through my mind, “What would happen if I spit on her? Would she still think I am loving?” But I never spit on those who admire me. To do so would be cruel, and besides I could never spit straight. I also am not as tough as I used to be, and I might get beat up in the ensuing fight.

In any case, it could be that if they see love in me, they will begin to see love in others. And if they begin to see love in others, they will see it in themselves. And if they see it in themselves, they will understand that they never could have seen it in others without it first being in them. And then perhaps when they see me in my weakest moments—whiney, clinging, and afraid—they will see and accept me with all my many bits and bobs.

It is also true that I do not want to do this; meaning that I do not want to live up to being the Buddha. I am me. I do not pretend to be anything other than what I am. I suppose this is a variation of my first statement, “But you don’t know me!” Disillusionment always follows being put on a pedestal, and I do not want to be the source of disillusionment; for I am much too insecure for that. I want to be loved always. Besides, being saintly sounds boring. I like to flirt with pretty girls. And I often have fantasies about them. I like to dance. I like to sing. I like to jump in cold rivers. I like to roll in mud. I like to be confused. I am never certain about anything, and I take great pride in it. I think humility is a highly overrated trait, and I am very humble.

And I especially do not want to live up to any standards other than my own, which leads me to the third thought that parades through my mind, “But what is it I do?” I never had a satisfactory answer for this question, until last night.

My brother called me and told me that his wife of many years, LaNae, had died unexpectedly from a blood clot. I could not feel. And I could think of only one thing. I knew I needed to be strong, first for my brother, but also for all those who also loved his best friend. My own grief could come later.

When I was a freshman in high school, she used to badger my brother to spend more time with me. I overheard her one day when I stopped by their house on the way home from school. I always went to the refrigerator first, and I heard her say, “He needs you. And you need to spend more time with him.” And she was right. I did need my big brother. My mother was sick most of the time. My father had to work and then come home and care for my mother. My sister had a new baby. So my brother decided to teach me to box.

As I was lacing up my boxing gloves, he told me, in uncharacteristic humility, “I know how to street fight, but there are plenty of guys who can clean my clock boxing.” Then he punched me in the head, hard. “Always hit them when they aren’t ready,” he calmly told me as I got up off the ground.

So over the next month or two, my brother taught me to box, which mostly consisted of me getting hit. One day, LaNae came out and shouted, “Tony, don’t hit him so hard! You’ll hurt him.”

Tony said, “He likes it.” And while his head was turned I whacked him hard in the side of the head. He staggered, looked at me, and smiled. I looked at LaNae and smiled. While my head was turned, my brother hit me. Who would do that to his own brother? I was a slow learner.

LaNae was always thinking about other people. She cared about them. She was a mother to everyone. She was a mother to me. She was a mother to my mother and father. She was a mother to my sister. She cared. She always cared. She was a mother to my brother at times too. She told me once, “The secret to a good marriage is having your husband out of the house as often as possible.”

She followed her own wisdom. She always encouraged my brother to golf. She would go to the door, peek out into a driving Oregon rain, and say, “It’s a perfect day for golfing. Why don’t you get your clubs?”

But her defining quality was her acceptance of others. She rarely said anything negative about anyone, and even then it was said with concern not malice. She allowed people to be weak and to flounder. And she did not condemn them. She was, in other words, compassionate.

All who knew her loved her. But it was not only because she accepted them. She was loved because she had the rarest of all gifts. She accepted herself. She treated herself with compassion. She did not hate herself for being who she was. She did not despise herself. To her, thoughts were just thoughts, and feelings were just feelings. If she had a hateful thought, she accepted that about herself without beating herself up for it. She allowed herself to be who she was. She laughed at herself. She treated herself as one of her children, and she was a good mother. She allowed herself to be flawed. She allowed this in herself to such an extent that her flaws somehow lost most of their power to upset her. She greeted herself with a smile and an embrace, and in so doing, she greeted others in a like manner.

And that is what I do. I greet myself with a smile and an embrace. And as time goes by, I greet others in a like manner. And when others tell me how loving I am, little do they know my dept to this incredible woman. Or, I suppose, it could be that I am the way I am because my brother addled my brains. But he loved her, and that is why he showed his love for me and addled my brains. And now I have no choice but to smile at myself.

Blessings,

John C. Conley


Questioner: Do you think it is wise for John to admit he has fantasies about the women he meets?

Baba Ram Jahn: I do not see the harm in it. All men have these fantasies, but few are honest enough to admit it.

Questioner: Father! Do you mean you fantasize about women?

Baba Ram Jahn: Come now, Child, what man has not met a beautiful woman and fantasized about her rubbing his feet? Or this is my favorite fantasy. I meet a beautiful woman and she makes a rhubarb pie for me. Bliss!

Questioner: Does she rub your feet with the pie?

Baba Ram Jahn: No, Daughter, she does something much better than that. She leaves the room and I get the pie all to myself.

Tea and Cookie Interview: Part 1

Tea and Cookie Interview: Part 2

Tea and Cookie Interview: Part 3