How I have amounted to nothing....

Two years ago, when I took on the challenge of writing a senior thesis I wanted more than anything else to synthesize ideas and theories I had discovered about the world (from the most microcosmic to the most macrocosmic)into a single explanation; a single understanding of what was wrong, why it was so, and how, through a grand-scale awareness, we as a planet could change: we could become enlightened. It was a lofty challenge and whether I nailed it or not, it was just a first attempt and a noble one all the same. Through crafting it over the course of a year I began to see myself skilled in an art of connecting; hardly an obvious/marketable trait but one I love in myself and have loved to watch grow from simple teen-angsty over analysis into what is today spiritual dedication. The ideas/theories proposed in my thesis have not changed, they have only grown richer as my knowledge of the world grows deeper. From this stream I have entered into a larger river. Osho's ashram is nothing more than a commune, or a kibbutz, where people work and live as proof of a different way: their is no religiosity as such, just pure spirituality through a deep connection to "natural existence": working and playing and loving and meditating as human animals; vessels of pure energy. Its a beautiful thesis in and of itself. What it proposes (as did my thesis before I ever came here)is that the human animal evolved a trait which no other animal had: awareness (of self, of his/her mortality, of a larger world,and of being a different kind of animal). With that awareness, fueled (as I propose) by a fear of death, the human created a reality ontop of the natural existence in which he was "forced" to live and called it, definitively, reality: a reality of logic and law and science and culture and religion, etc. The foreman for this masive construction project was/is/and always will be the ego. And as the ego is insatiable (if not controlled by a stronger awareness of self) it will keep constructing indefinately, always wanting more. Today one cannot help but marvel as the human once again has begun a new construction project - fed up with the reality he created before, hungry for something even more controllable, more immortalizing - and so, with computers, he has begun to creat a virtual reality. Look at google earth, or second life, or myspace, or wiki, or come to Bombay where a child is hungry and begs but can use his cellphone to call over more beggars, or watch reality television for two seconds. The great irony, and the most important connection to see (as I tried to make clear in my thesis) is that all of this "progress" just takes us further and further from our most natural essence; we loose connection to the energies that bind all living things and when we loose connection we get into trouble. To regain this connection, only possible through authentic daily meditation, is to attain enlightenment; to re-member oneself with one's self; to reconnect; to return to child-like innocence. And who in history has been enlightened? No christian, no buddhist, no jew, no muslim: no religious person.But Christ was, and Buddha was, and Mohammad was, and others. This is Osho's best-made point: dont be a christian, be a christ. We are all naturally enlightened, its nothing to attain...you just have to remember it by going inside. I wanted to put all of this forward because last night I took sanyas: dedicating myself to my self; re-membering my natural essence and committing myself to meditation. The ceremony was the most beautiful event of my life (thus far) and all of the love that passed through me only reminded me of how lucky I am in life. In the main auditorium (a huge marble pyramid; check osho.com for pictures) the whole commune came out (willingly, and out of love)to celebrate just the idea of taking sanyas; as it is the core of existence, the core of enlightenment/awareness. We all sat in a circle and meditated together; then my name was called "Bodhi Arnava" and I went into the center; with one hundred plus people sitting around me, some I knew before, some I was close with, most I just met that night. We meditate for a while, listening to the silence around us and within us and then Osho begins to speak (its a recording, of which there seem to be an endless amount) about sanyas and everything I said above: but again, it is to listen to a great wealth of knowledge, a human encyclopedia, but a human all the same. Then he tells a joke to lighten the mood, and out of pure coincidence the joke he told was this: a jewish boy from New York tells his father that he wants to go to India to find himself. The father says, why? its dirty and youll get sick. The boy says, yeah but I could just the same get killed crossing fifth avenue. The father says, ok but youll worry your mother. So the boy says,everything worries my mother. So the father says, ok but if you go youll just be wasting time and youll wind up amounting to nothing. So the boy says, Im glad you understand. After the joke and everyone laughed hard, knowing my particular storyand the coincidence at hand, a live band begins to play and everyone dances in celebration. Everyone, and I mean everyone, came up to me with smiles and hugs and kisses and says the sweetest most genuine things: Happybirthday...or welcome home...or congratulations, etc. Its so beautiful and I was so happy; feeling so at home, so connected, so understood; not because I have surrendered something tothe commune as a means of becoming a member of something larger (as is a cult) but rather by just being me, authentically, and in my self reconnecting to the larger concentration of energy within and thus the larger concentration of energy without. Then another person who is taking sanyas does the same thing and for two hours this went on. So wonderful. It was just such a nice way to conclude myexperience here. I leave on Monday and have decided against Calcutta, as the rains have brought massive flooding. SO Instead I make myway more north to the himalayans for a couple of weeks. Im so f-ing psyched its rediculous. Ok. So thats it. Just a great two weeks, a great last few months, a great last few years, a great last few lives. I say this now only so that it may be heard: enlightenment is not some high point along the road, its making the journey stage by stage...in awareness...in love. This place is a great place to come on that journey, but its just a place all the same. With love, Arnava