It is a commencement speech by a guy named Paul Hawken. He is a brilliant Enviornmentalist and Educator, as well as a Green Entrepreneur. I found it pretty inspiring. I really appreciate inspiration. If I don’t do my yoga practice, or if I surround myself with the wrong sort of media and entertainment, I can start to get depressed. This is a powerful call to action, and it is uplifting as well. Here is a pretty good excerpt. If you’d like to read the rest of it, its here.
This planet came with a set of operating instructions, but we seem to have misplaced them. Important rules like don’t poison the water, soil, or air, and don’t let the earth get overcrowded, and don’t touch the thermostat have been broken. Buckminster Fuller said that spaceship earth was so ingeniously designed that no one has a clue that we are on one, flying through the universe at a million miles per hour, with no need for seatbelts, lots of room in coach, and really good food – but all that is changing. There is invisible writing on the back of the diploma you will receive, and in case you didn’t bring lemon juice to decode it, I can tell you what it says: YOU ARE BRILLIANT, AND THE EARTH IS HIRING. The earth couldn’t afford to send any recruiters or limos to your school. It sent you rain, sunsets, ripe cherries, night blooming jasmine, and that unbelievably cute person you are dating. Take the hint. And here’s the deal: Forget that this task of planet-saving is not possible in the time required. Don’t be put off by people who know what is not possible. Do what needs to be done, and check to see if it was impossible only after you are done.
If you are familiar with sand mandalas, you know one of their most important attributes is their impermanence. The monks carefully, painstakingly create the mandala, and then, swoosh, they brush the mandala away. Many people who watch the process feel a great sense of poignancy or loss. Hopefully, at least some gain some insight into anicca, the truth that all things that begin, must end. We are encouraged to realize that our fortunes, our relationships, and our very lives, are no more solid than the colorful pile of dust that remains at the end of the ritual.
I found an unlikely mandala on the internet today, a mandala just as temporary, and no less beautiful as the Tibetan Sand Mandalas. There is a festival at the Buddhist Temples in Lop Buri, Thailand, last Sunday in November. The townspeople offer huge buffets to the plethora of monkeys that roam the temple ground. It is said that offering the food to the monkeys offers great good fortune, perhaps because the monkeys are in some way holy. their behavior during the festival is so similar to that of the Artist Monks. There is another theory that perhaps it is good fortune to feed the monkeys because they are the center of the tourist trade and economy of the area. So, they say thank you to the monkeys, and create another tourist attraction, and perhaps some good karma as well. Everybody’s happy.
Many of these buffets are huge, round, patterened pallets of food. Clearly, they share many qualities and principles with mandalas. They are sacred circles and temporary dwellings of the most sacred residents of Lop Buri. And they are impermanant. The monkeys literaly live and eat atop these magnificent structures, as they take them apart, bite by bite. Judging by the pictures and videos, it is a fantastic celebration, and a ritual with a clear, inherent ending. When the food is gone, the party is over.
Not everyone likes dates soaked in ghee, but the people who do, REALLY LIKE dates soaked in ghee. I happen to think they are fantastic. It is so simple and wonderful, it could only come from the wisdom of ayurveda. Joseph at Joyful Belly Ayurveda sent them to us last week. You can order them from him, (he also make some fantastic agni-stoking, pippali cookies) and they are also simple to make at home. Simply pour warm ghee over dates, and voila! There are many benefits to eating these delicious treats. They have a sweet flavor, which is great for cravings, and excellent for vata. They are also full of ojas, making them a fantastic aphrodisiac, and tonic rejuvenative (rasayana). Big Yum!
