Quick Reads From Awakening Wholeness: a book that helps young leaders develop compassion for Myself, Others and The Earth.
Our Mission is supporting Youth Globally in learning Compassion for Oneself, Others & our Environment.
The whole of existence is love. And this love is meant for your understanding and evolution. It wants you to be awake, happy, and healthy through your understanding and choices. What can we do to be open to this love? How can we receive the infinite hugs that existence is sending us every single moment? When you put the first letters of the words “Humility, Understanding, Gratitude, and Service” together, you see the word H.U.G.S.
These are the four doorways to awakening Compassion and being a part of the compassionate dance of existence. Let’s look at each one briefly:
Humility
When we remember the interconnectedness of life and the thousands of processes that go into making something happen, we cannot help being humble. When I remember that all is love, all is wholeness and that there is really no one inside, just this body moving like an empty flute through which wholeness is playing its music, I remain humble. Humility comes from remembering my oneness with the wholeness of life. It also helps to remember that all of life is ever-changing and impermanent. All the forms and structures that you see — everything around you — are transient.
When I begin to see how my life has been formed and shaped by hundreds and thousands of people and processes, I cannot help being humble. If my grandparents, great- grandparents, and ancestors had not existed — both from my mother’s family and my father’s family — I wouldn’t have been here. So, I have to be really grateful to my ancestors for being here. I have to be grateful to the farmers who grew the chickpeas I just had for lunch. I also had green spinach. And again, if it hadn’t been for the sun, the rain, and the earthworms and microbes in the soil, I wouldn’t have had that green spinach.
Also, the farmers who grew the spices, the people who filled the cooking gas cylinders in a factory — if all these people had not done what they usually do, I wouldn’t be thriving at this moment. If all my teachers had not taught me, if the person who made my computer and software had not done so, this book would not be with you. When I think about all the people who are contributing to my life at this moment and have given me so much, I am humbled! I cannot, even for the slightest moment, say, “I have done this; I’ve done that.” That’s sheer nonsense. How can I say I’ve done this when even the notion of a separate “I” is a piece of fiction?
My grandfather, Maheshwar Nath Wakhlu, was travelling on horseback from Srinagar, which lies in the centre of the Kashmir valley along the River Jhelum, to Gilgit, in north Kashmir. He was relocating as part of his work. My grandmother, Lilawati, was holding my father, Omkar, who was a baby at the time, in her lap and was feeding him. When she finished nursing him and was handing him over to the horsemen who were carrying him, Omkar slipped out of her hand and fell off the cliff into the raging Indus River, which ran alongside the road. He
was wrapped up in a blanket and was therefore bobbing like a cork on the surface of the Indus River. Several horsemen jumped into the raging river, unmindful of their own safety, and rescued the baby.
If the horsemen, whose names I do not even know, had not jumped into the water at the risk of their own lives to save the baby floating downstream, my father wouldn’t be alive. And if my father hadn’t been alive, he wouldn’t have had me. And my father and I wouldn’t have written the book ‘One Wholesome World’ together. We have to thank those horsemen (who saved baby Omkar) that day for my presence on the planet right now.
Humility leads to a deep understanding that we are deeply interconnected. The more I dissolve into humility, the more I begin to see how interconnected we all are and how much everything depends on everything else. When I feed my mind with inspiring thoughts and surround myself with inspiring people who make my eyes shine, I remain humble and in touch with wholeness.
Humility is also letting go of the arrogance that surrounds the idea that I know best and that my view is the right view. A ‘6’ when seen from the top looks like a ‘9’. People can argue for hours about whether the same symbol is a 6 or a 9! Humility makes one a better observer and listener. And as we listen with compassion, our understanding of life expands.
True humility is the gate to the peace of God. True humility is to desire nothing, to demand nothing, and to hope for nothing, material or spiritual, for oneself. True humility is to be absolutely empty of all thoughts, except one: the thought of God, and to not expect anything from that emptiness.
True humility is to be inwardly empty and naked at the feet of God, for no reason at all. True humility is to abandon everything, to surrender everything to God inwardly, and to not expect anything in return. True humility is what being “poor in spirit” means. True humility is the perfect silence of the mind, spirit, and heart. True humility is not weak, shy, or hesitant.
True humility is true power. It’s about holding the power, the beauty, and the light of God. It’s about being fully visible (fully here and now, fully open, totally unprotected) and being fully invisible and transparent (without a trace of self-concern or worry about one’s desire, will, or self-image) at the same time.
True humility is about being fully present and fully absent at the same time. True humility is pure silence. Only in this silence can the voice of God be heard.
~ Saint Francis of Assisi
