All About The Wonderful World of Mucus

I’ve been out of commission for the past few days—with Obligatory Vrindavan Sickness (or OVS). This occurrence of OVS was a non-stop joyride from “Sore Throat and Stuffed Nose” to “Sore Throat and Very Very Stuffed Nose with Loss of Energy and Joie de Vivre” culminating in “Completely Blocked Nose, Fever, Hallucinations, Absolute Zero Energy and Ardent Desire to Leave The Country.” Meanwhile life went on around me, thousands of laughing, snacking pilgrims pouring into the Krishna Balarama Mandir amid the smoke, dust, and tooting taxis of Shri Vrindavan Dham, the holiest place in India. All I could do was look at them, slack-jawed from stuffiness, wanting only to curl up on the nearest available dusty marble surface, unable to comprehend how anyone on Earth could enjoy life. Everybody might as well have been on TV.

During one of my dizzy, labored, four foot treks to our bathroom’s Hindustan Vitreous brand sink to loudly deposit the multicolored gooey contents of my clogged nasal passages, I thought, “These bodies are amazing.” You can’t predict what they’ll do. The amount of mucus I’ve snorted and spat over the past three days astounds me. “What is that stuff?” I wondered. I decided it was simply another item to add to the mountain of graphic evidence that I am not—in any way shape or form—the enjoyer, controller or creator of the universe (or even of mucus). Why mucus?

Then I remembered something I once heard from someone Smarter Than I:

A normal, healthy person is sat-chit-ananda, (or SCA). SCA (or “blissful, full of knowledge, and eternal”) is Business as Usual for people in the Greater Spiritual Reality (or GRS). Such persons think (honestly, without smirking or winking), “Krishna/Vishnu/God/Allah is the Supreme Enjoyer and Controller, and I’m OK with just being His servant.” “Blissful” implies no annoying, painful, and disorienting recurrences of acute nasopharyngitis. “Eternal” means no weepy funerals or total, utter severance of loving relationships. I’m not making this up.

If we’re not OK with GRS—for whatever fabulously brilliant reasons—then what? Krishna is kind. He’s not insecure or authoritarian. He’s accommodating. He generously provides a whole alternative “reality” for We Bright Ones Who Demand Something Different: an existence that is NOT blissful, NOT permanent, and NOT full of knowledge. Thus we get the pleasure of walking around in a Temporary Material Body (or TMB), and all the mucus it can possibly hold.