The Wandering Mind and the Power of Meditation

The "stream of consciousness in fiction" is a reflection of the mind, the wandering kind that is difficult to calm or control as it drifts from thought to thought. This is the egoic mind that harbors anger, hate, jealousy and other emotional poisons and thoughts, Covered with layers of illusion, if not delusion, it can only be liberated by a thorough cleansing with the power of meditation and concentration.

The blogger as a young actor in a play staged at the plaza in Laoag City, Philippines

Ilokano sugar cane workers in Hawaii. They were called pucan cane then, A surviving cane cutter and his wife in one of upscale subdivision in in the so-called Aloha State. Are they still alive? (Photo by blogger)

     Of course,  meditation is another process that is difficult to do.

WE CREATE OUR SUFFERING, OUR OWN HELL, OUR OWN SAMSARA

"Iti ruar ken ikub daytoy mangliwengliweng nga awang, addatayo latta a sipaparnged kadagiti berde a batbato ti lglagip iti daan a pagilian.Ket agtunglabtayo iti iliw iti bukod a kalsada, iti atiddog a a puraw a kadaratan ti baybay, iti asul a kabambantayan.Kankanayon a mariingak tunggal sumungadak iti daan nga ili ket addaak manen nga agpampanunot iti sipnget iti parbangon."

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Sinuktandan ti nagan daydi kalsadami a Jose Palma a nangputar iti Philippine National Anthem. V. Ligot ti nagan daytoy a pagpagnaak idi agiskuelaaak iti haiskul. (Victorino Ligot, maysa a padi a nayanak iti Laoag ken nagbalin nga obispo ti San Fernando, La Union.) Agtung-ed daytoy a dalan iti asideg idi ti garahe ti Philippine Rabbit Bus Lines ket agpalaudak a kumamang iti laud a kalsada, tarengtengek agingga a madanonko ti Ilocos Norte Trade School. Agawidak iti pangngaldaw ket agsubliakto manen a mapan agbasa.. Kasta a kasta ti inar-aramidko iti uppat a tawen. Adda idin sumagmamano a dyip, malaksid iti kalesa,  ngem diak malagip no nagluganak kadagitoy a napan iti eskuelaan.

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It was Bishop Mario Baltazar of Batanes who gave me the imprimatur to become a member of an ecumenical group that translated the whole Bible into Ilokano from the so-called original languages of Greek and Hebrew.

The Ilokano Bible Project, under the aegis of the Philippine Bible Society, was composed of Rev. Anacleto Guerrero, Rev. Juan Marigza, Rev. Gervacio Tovera, Rev. Fr. Godofredo Albano, Mrs. Patrocinia Tayaban, a deaconnes and the layman and Ilokano writer Peter La. Julian, with Rosalinda Camat and Rev. Noel Osborn as coordinator. It started in in November 1969 in Baguio City and was finished several years later. I did the apochrypha, the books between the Old and New Testaments, at the Bishop's Palace. Bishop Antonio Salgado was then the bishop of Baguio.

We don't know what happened to Rev. Osborn who was sent by the US-based United Bible Societies for the project. Is he still alive in Ohio, at least, that's what I know he came from?His family was with him then--his wife Emma, and their children Cindy and Philip. They lived near the Translation Center at Bokawkan Road.

Mrs. Camat lives in Baguio; Mrs. Tayaban in Tuding, Benguet; while Bishop Marigza resides in Agoo, La Union' and PLJ is an immigrant in US. The rest of the translators have died. I was supposed to be the youngest member of the Ilokano group then.

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     We create our own suffering, our own hell, our own samsara as the Buddhists call it.

     My readings of Oriental texts and ancient gurus and teachers like Jesus of Nazareth, tell me we can only escape this bane of existence by liberating ourselves from the passions of anger, jealousy, hatred, selfishness and other harmful emotions and thoughts.

    Since time immemorial, this ruinous human nature has caused so much pain, conflicts and wars, killing millions and destroying cities and nations.

The blogger with then the Philippines' foremost essayist Kerima Polotan- Tuvera
during a literary awarding ceremony at thee Port Area in Manila.

Native bonsai infront of the Ilocos Norte Provincial Capitol in Laoag City

Opening Windows for Rebirth

Let go the person you used to be, says writer Lama Surya Das. In fact, "Letting Go The Person You Used To Be" is the title of his book, which advises that if we want to change and move on, we have to do away with attachments that impede our way out of the miserable life we have been living. These attachments include beliefs, people, places, possessions like books, even the house we have been living in for a number of years. It is these attachments that cause our pain and sorrows, he says.

A DATE WITH HISTORY

December 26. With Mother Lily, Dr. Voltaire Joseph, Rene, Estelita, Peter at Cabrillo National Monument in San Diego, CA.

The place which overlooks the city of San Diego was named after the explorer of California, Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo who and his crew "sailed into this harbor and became the first Europeans to set foot on what would later become the west cost of the United States."--from a post card.

It was late in the afternoon, when we arrived here and cars were still making a bee-line for the entrance where a fee was collected for each vehicle. DR. Bong flashed her mother's senior card for US parks and we were waved in by the guard in US uniform.

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"We all have choices in the way we react to the words we hear. Our lives and the lives of all those around us will be significantly improved if we choose to react positively rather than negatively."--Ben Carson, author of "One Nation"

MAINSTREAM MEDIA AS PURVEYORS OF HALF-LIES AND DISINFORMATION

     Philippine mainstream media, print and broadcast, have a tendency to warp their news and opinions and convey them as gospel truths. This is not journalism of the 5 Ws ( who, where, why, what, when) and H (how) variety. Whatever genre the journalist writes--news, editorial, feature--he or she starts the facts that must be checked, doubled checked if need be. This is not only accuracy with respect to names of persons and things and places, but on statements or quotations made by persons of interest or subject matter especially those controversial comments.

     Sadly to say, these mainstream media, for the most part, don't dig deeper on the why and how of things they are looking for. "Bias" is the name of their game that give them handsome dividends.

     For example, they keep on harping on human rights abuses committed during the martial law regime, blaming everything to Ferdinand Marcos, referring to him as dictator and Hitler. (Describing Marcos as dictator and liking him to Hitler is fiction, not objective journalism. Why the name-calling? Did Marcos kill or ordered the killing of people? And how many people were killed during his reign? Millions as did Hitler who caused the gassing of 6 million Jews?)

     If these abuses were really a fait accompli, who did it or what forces under the command of Marcos committed them? His private army? Or the Armed Forces of the Philippines that were at his beck and call at that time? Did he order the executions  of these victims? Did he issue a presidential decree to the effect?

     Manila Times columnist Roberto Tiglao, who headed a communist party group in Southern Tagalog during the martial law regime, has written about the Philippine Constabulary, then headed by Fidel Ramos, that did most of the human rights abuses. Ramos, who became president of the Philippines after Cory Aquino, has not refuted the charges.

    Who were these victims? Were they combatants, physically and mentally? Did they belong to the Kabataang Makabayan, a creation of Jose Maria Sison, the former caudillo of the Communist Party of the Philippines and its armed wing, the New People's Army?

     And many other questions that mainstream media appear to have ignored since Ferdinand Marcos was ousted in 1986?

THE KNOWN AND THE UNKNOWN

     In relation to the election, a fait accompli, of a president:

     Known things are scary and it is possible that more scary are things that happened that are or were not known and things that will yet to happen. The blogger and his wife flew to the US legally and entered the American dream, but sometimes we shudder and try not to forget to remember all these things.

     Yet hope springs eternal, as they say, and we expect to enjoy our days in the so-called land of milk and honey.

The Bishops' Theological Confusion Or Dementia?

Does it follow that, by their behavior against Ferdinand Marcos and his heirs, Philippine archbishops worship the God of Wrath of the Old Testament?

(The deity with the tetragrammaton name would not forgive a transgression, even if the deed is committed by just one man, and would destroy, as he did in Biblical times, the sinner and all members of his tribe including his animals.)

Or are the bishops suffering from theological confusion, or selective dementia, and forget that they are the High Priests of the Compassionate Almighty God?

And speaking of accountability, how can a dead man make up for what he did, whatever these are? His heirs had nothing to do with what he committed during his lifetime. This is the askew logic of Marcos haters.

Banner near the St. William Cathedral in Laoag City, Ilocos Norte 

The Ilocos Norte Provincial Capitol

Tired and weary of reading hate messages, especially those excoriating a corpse.

It is absurd, inhuman and un-Christian to kick a dead horse or spit or urinate on a cadaver.

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"First, learn much and seek to understand it profoundly."--Talmud