The Perishables

Observing everything in this world is pretty much threatening, especially if you come closer to the truth: nothing is static or fixed, everything is changing, everything is impermanent. To realize this is a sweeping dilemma, and I have observed this in many instance. Like a small toddler I saw a few years ago who is now an almost six-footer teenager. Or seeing a very different appearance of a place that I haven't visited for years, being shocked of contrasting it to the past image imprinted in my mind. Or some new stuff that I bought, like a shirt, a pair of shoes or sandals; after several months, what used to be a new, shining stuff with a resin-like aromatic scent has worn down bit by bit, fraying and chipping in many corners, and its glowing quality has been heavily scratched. I have seen this reality in spending my money, or going to a certain place, or experiencing a new situation. They are all gone and the only trace that remains is my memory of them. All these things are known as the Perishables.

It seems that we need to edit what the Buddha has taught. Life is not suffering at all. Life becomes a suffering because of the truth that every thing in life is actually a Perishable. Nothing is not a perishable. Every thing that has begun will about to end. This is the cycle of truth. We all suffer because we have always thought that Perishables won't expire at all. Whenever we cling to this idea, our lives become a chain of miseries, because we tend to regret to the time that has passed, cling to the realities that have long gone in our midst, and fix the things, and even people, the way we see them. And we will find out that doing these are futile ways to live, wasting our precious life in making sure that whatever we want to stay must stay the way we want. And, ironically, we often choose to do this than to let go, and continue to suffer, despite the desire to break free and be happy. Running after the Perishables will soon cause us to perish with them.

"Running after the Perishables will soon cause us to perish with them."

There is a profound wisdom in understanding the Perishables that I have noticed in my contemplations. The soon I get worried, I automatically sense that I am worrying of fixing the Perishable, of grasping its slippery texture, and find it easing out from my grip. It makes me feel sick, tired, wasted, and anxious, and soon I lose my control over the situation, especially over my mental composure. This experience has led me to see what I worry about is a Perishable. The sooner I see this I immediately engage myself to a timeless retrospection, imagining what my emotional and mental state would be like after 2 years of recalling this very moment. Would I still be anxious? Or would I laugh out loud, or simply smile for seeing that those Perishables have long gone perished? And I would come to my senses that I have nothing to worry about. I relax and accept things and events as they are, even if they are my inner anxieties or my outer worries.

Whatever perishes returns to the cycle of creation and re-creation, and it means I have to let them go to that process. Any people, material things or situation that comes across my path are all Perishables in one way or the other. It is not that they are unimportant, but to see them as Perishables is to honor their once role in our Soul, and as they return to the source of creation, we also honor their process of renewing the energy of the source. If we keep the Perishables in our heart, we will clutter our attention and limit our movement on our sacred space. They will appear to be junk that rusts and stinks in our consciousness. This is the call to clean our space, and let the Perishables perish in their own natural way. As they perish, we cultivate a new growth in our awareness. We allow the growth of Love.

I keep on reminding myself that if I am beginning to worry on the Perishable, I must stop, and let Love fill my heart. For I know that Love is the only stable and bedrock state that I can trust and cling to, that I can firmly grasp and grip. Despite the irony that Love is an essence and its nature is intangible, it is the most tangible truth I can ever hold on to. Love, and the Perishables that grow from its fertile ground remains ever-changing, but will never, ever perish.

Building Blocks

Of all the toys I had as a little boy, I think Lego for me was the best. My fresh imagination creates structures using Lego blocks of different shapes, sizes, and colors. Perhaps I wasn't just playing with them; I was creating possibilities. It was my early days of creative exploration. I could imagine all sorts of forms, structures and humanoid characters. I could create different kinds of aircraft and spaceships that can travel to my boundless fantasies. I was in my own virtual universe made together by my Lego blocks and my infinite imagination.

Such a toy is ingenious, says Norwegian author Jostein Gaarder in his novel on the history of philosophy, Sophie's World. Lego gives children not only the power to create from simple blocks, but also the power to destroy. Here, the essence of destruction is not about to eliminate or crush anything. It is, in fact, the very impetus of re-creation. The process of destruction is not so much of destroying, but of re-creating. Whenever kids pick the blocks and attached them according to the forms they wish, thereafter they may simply choose to disintegrate them and bring them back to the same basic blocks they once were. Then, they can create whatever new forms they wish from the same set of blocks. Nothing is being destroyed, after all. Not a single block is wasted. Every block can be used again as a part of another created form.

Is the Universe made the same way? Are we not, living and nonliving, made from the same ingenious building block, the same stuff that stars and galaxies are made? If so, then whatever is created in our material and physical reality will soon perish or disintegrate naturally, and the "blocks" that have made them will be used again to create new physical forms? The constant process of creation and re-creation lies in the ingenious hand of the Absolute, the Source of all basic building blocks that makes every form be formed and transformed, the one we often call God--the one otherwise known as Love.

How does Love create and re-create? Such words cannot describe it. For the process of knowing Love is beyond the specific processes of creation and re-creation. In the realm of Love, both of them are indistinguishable. And it's own building block is itself. Love creates and re-creates Love. As Love creates Love, it manifest in millions of ways. Love is the very essence which builds all the color, the forms and the possibilities of our reality.

"Love creates and re-creates Love...Love is the very essence which builds all the color, the forms and the possibilities of our reality."

Take sometime to observe the place where you are right now. Every thing is made of that essence, of that basic atom or quantum particles, so to speak, which, according to physicist, make anything real and tangible. You and the table and the computer and wall and the water are made of the same particle, forming in different ways and manifesting in different shapes, sizes, textures, and colors. With those differences, experience becomes diverse, and expressions becomes myriad, all according to their functions that support every turn of your very existence. Nonetheless, all of them, including you, are impermanent. In time, we will perish, but process remains the same, creating and re-creating innumerable forms, having their unique, kaleidoscopic nature. Love is understood in this process, by seeing that this is the endless dance of creation and re-creation, like the dance of Shiva.


While we often see stumbling blocks in our creative processes, we can begin to see and use them as building blocks of Love, from which all creative momentum accelerates us to the peak dynamics of creation and recreation. Like the Lego block, no block can be a waste, for each has its purpose to build and form the grand structure our imagination creates. We transform each block and make them again a part of new forms, of new transformations.

Love is creating and re-creating Love moment to moment. You and I are both creations and re-creations of Love. The beauty of this is that we are not just at the mercy of those processes. We are, ourselves, the processes of creation and re-creation. All we have to do is to participate consciously. So we can begin to create and recreate Love with full consciousness. So we can form and transform the world into Love. And the only building block we can use is Love.






photo (above) by Reeport

Voting Beyond

photo by linh.ngân

I was trying to visualize an election without using any automation technology or trashy paraphernalia. In a sense, it would be highly impossible, since our electoral systems run only through technology, be it manual or digital counting. But how about an election without all of these messy counting that are often subjected to inevitable fraud, an election that only uses intentions of light? Would this be possible?

Consider the Intention Experiment led by Lynne McTaggart. These are series of experiments that demonstrate the power of intention and how it influences external subjects like plants and microorganisms. In 2007, one of their pioneering projects was launched, called the Leaf Intention Experiment. Experimenters instructed participants around the globe to visualize the leaves of a geranium plant glowing with light. Through punctured holes on the leaf surface, light emissions were measured. Leaves were photographed using a highly sophisticated camera. Results showed statistically significant increase in light emissions of leaves intended with light. This experiment, along with others, is resonant to the nonlocal effect of intentions. It means that wherever we are in the world, our deepest intentions are effective, regardless of distance and time. This experiment also reminds me of many cases of how prayer works, discussed by Larry Dossey in his book Healing Words.

What are the implications of these experiments in this coming elections? Perhaps in a utopic way of thinking, our future might develop some kind of technology that will increase the extensions of intentions, particularly of Light. If possible, in a highly sophisticated electoral system, we are about to choose candidates by the virtue of our intentions, translated through light emissions accurately recorded and counted! (in Mctaggart's experiments, light or biophoton emissions were captured, analyzed and counted one by one. This means that results can still be counted.) Stretching our imagination on this kind of light intention-based election, candidates would sit down on a dark chamber (so there would be no chance to manipulate "light"), while people vote in precincts by casting their intentions on pictures of candidates of their choice. No need to write or mark any ballot. Intention is enough to do the job.

Doubts may still linger. What if there are flying voters, or manipulation of results, assuming that some candidates who voraciously desire to win would come up with their battalion of "light intenders" to increase their chance of winning? This is, in theory, possible. On the other hand, what if light cannot be cast with maleficent intentions? If the candidate tries to do this, results will be compromised. So it appears that the intention-based system will create innumerable problems in fulfilling a desire of fair and clean elections.

Stop. There is something wrong in this picture.

Even if this intention technology is available, it will still not be viable to serve the current status quo. Our society continues to starve for external power, and that is why elections are fertile ground for fraud and violence. My high school history teacher laments on this: "As long as the world is ruled by man, there will be no perfect government." Our highest ideals on true democracy and governance will continue to be tainted by greed, anger and ignorance, all in pursuit of ruling power over people. Unless each individual claims and asserts his or her own responsibility and integrity, there will be an endless litany of blames toward the so-called leaders of nation and their corrupted bureaucracies. Unless leaders, politicians, and bureaucrats transform their self-centered agenda into selfless service to humanity, there will still be perpetuation of abusive power that tyrannize weak people who continue to search for external solutions.

"Voting is not just about selection of who is fitted to run any government. It is about an empowered choice, of choosing beyond platforms and sweet promises."

There is a need for overhauling the system but not to change any external technology, like the ones done in electoral systems. Intention-based technology is true and effective, but to use it for external objectives like elections won't allow it to work. Intentions are inside jobs, inner soulwork that requires full awareness and intuitive discernment. This internal technology, as what Gregg Braden calls it, is highly effective if each and everyone of us awakens to the reality that whatever change we desire starts from within. That is, our inner consciousness in the essence of Love is the bedrock foundation that empowers our choices and decisions. When we create intentions of goodwill and harmony, Love begins to manifest in our actions. In this way, we influence each other's knowing and capacity in pursuit of extending our hands in initiating external transformations. We are now voting, in a literal and symbolic sense, for the process of change, not for any candidates who promise change and break them.

We can now begin to create intentions of light and make others "glow". We are literally the light of the world, we just exert our abilities in casting the light of our Soul. We can intend change by refusing to hate, blame and criticize, yet doing our contributions in our own unique ways. This is voting in the most ideal level, by doing what is needed to be done. We are filling ourselves with the feelings of Love while stopping corruption, conserving our environment, upholding freedom and dignity, saving lives from poverty and hunger or innovating efficient systems and technology. This feeling of Love is not a fleeting feeling of euphoria, but the deepest desire of understanding and serving the needs of others, which charges each action with compassion and joy.

Voting is not just about selection of who is fitted to run any government. It is about an empowered choice, of choosing beyond platforms and sweet promises. And an empowered choice is always a powerful intention, of casting the light of Love to the hearts of people.

May we always vote for Love.