Day 37. I recall wandering around Prague on my own on Thanksgiving 2000, eating with international expatriates in a Vietnamese restaurant in Rome 2002 and dining on exquisite turkey mole with my Spanish school buddies in Oaxaca 2003.
I've never been one to specially separate out the holidays from the magic of ordinary life. So it's not a huge sacrifice to be in Thailand for Christmas and New Year, or India for Valentines' Day this time around. In fact, quite the opposite.
Via Collected Miscellany "The First Thanksgiving": In a December 1621 letter, Edward Winslow describes some of the first Thanksgiving events:
At which time, amongst other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest king Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation and bestowed on our governor, and upon the captain and others. And although it be not always so plentiful as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want that we often wish you partakers of our plenty.
If we asked Winslow which of these details were secular, that is apart from God, he would say none of them, if he understood our question. The pilgrims, even the natives, didn't think within a secular/sacred dichotomy.
Everything was sacred to them...
How Zen those early pilgrims were! Everything. Everywhere. Everyone. Everyday. Sacred.
Once we have achieved satori, we must get out of its "sticky morass" and return to the world. The genius of Zen lies in its determination to fuse the temporal and the eternal; to widen the doors of perception so the wonder of the satori experience can flood everyday life. - Huston Smith, The World's Religions (one of the few reference books I'll bring along on the liveblogging journey through the tsunami-struck countries)
"If you cannot find the meaning of life in an act as simple as that of doing the dishes, you will find it nowhere," continues scholar Huston Smith. Zen's satori, the flash of "reality that defies ordinary language," isn't the culmination but rather close to the true starting point in the spiritual journey. To ponder:
Asked what Zen training leads to, a Western student who had been practicing for seven years answered, "No paranormal experiences that I can detect. But you wake up in the morning and the world seems so beautiful you can hardly stand it." - Huston Smith, The World's Religions
My thanksgiving wish for all: May the prosperity we experience be a blessing to all people.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Bonus: Couldn't help but notice the popularity (#1 last night on BlogPulse and currently 341 del.icio.us bookmarks to NPR's This I Believe: There is No God). Rarely does anyone consider that the idea of God and the idea of not-God are simply two sides of the very same coin. "You now think that you are an individual, that there is the universe and that God is beyond the cosmos. So there is the idea of separateness. This idea must go. For God is not separate from you or the cosmos." - Ramana Maharshi
p.s. This year I'm spending time close to home as it feels right around the corner to the December 15th departure date.
Two other good books in this area (1) is "Mindfulness" by Ellen Langer (2) "The Power of Impossible Thinking" by Jerry Wind. In the latter, the opening 20 pages most effectively sets the stage that the world you live in is in your mind set.
I could go on but may turn those thoughts into a posting and then trackback here. Hope your holiday was good. Thanks for the inspiration!
Posted by: Steve Sherlock | Nov 26, 2005 at 04:55 AM