Be Here Now with Mantra and Cow

Am I doing the right thing right now?

How do I define “right?”

I long to have a steady sense that where I am and what I’m doing is “right.” And by right I mean I’m supposed to be there, supposed to be doing what I’m doing.

Yesterday was Saraswati Puja. I started this blog yesterday. I said I’d keep it up. Thus, now I feel OK in the connectedness department.

Sometimes I have a strong sense of this, and sometimes it escapes me almost completely. I feel lost, like taking a spacewalk without the umbilical cord, and the shuttle flies off without me.

Maybe that’s what “yoga” really means; you feel connected all the time. As opposed to cut off, isolated, lonely, like you don’t belong anywhere at all.

Twenty years ago, before I started chanting, I often felt like that. I had no idea who I was or what I was supposed to do. How could I know? Nobody came and told me. I didn’t trust my parents, and my teachers were too busy. Did I really have to figure everything out for myself? It didn’t seem possible.

Rather than whine about the failure of my high school guidance counselors, why don’t I tell you when I do feel like I’m connected.

When I chant, in between each couple of mantras, I take a breath. Taking the breath is like climbing a rollercoaster hill. Chanting the mantra is like riding down it. Just at the point when I let go of the incoming breath and begin “Hare Krishna. . .” I feel connected.

It’s not like this all the time. If I’m distracted, I forget this, and I disconnect with what I’m doing.

Hey, maybe that’s it: “be connected to whatever it is you’re doing.” You have a sense of duty or purpose, and you don’t second-guess yourself into an unnecessary existential tailspin.

By that I mean the perverse feeling of being able to jump off into Niagara Falls or off the lip of the Grand Canyon. Sure, if you really wanted to, you could. But why? Why even tempt yourself to the edge, with all the vertigo?

This is why it’s recommended to live a simple life. Simple means you take care of what you need to take care of. Ideally, you’re connected to the Earth, connected to a community in which you play a valuable role socially and economically. You’re settled, in mind and body.

We live in an age (especially in so-called “developed” countries) of un-settlement. The availability of petroleum gives us an artificial sense that we can go anywhere we want. The possibility of relocating is always in the back of our minds. This is unsettling.

Why is it that there’s more mental illness in “developed” countries than in undeveloped ones? We’re not grounded. Literally. We’ve come apart from the Earth. In Sanskrit it’s mano rathena “hovering aloft in the mental sphere.” We’re never really anywhere.

In Ayurveda, mental disease is a disease of vata, air. How do you treat it? It has to be balanced with the other elements-earth and water.

I used to milk cows every day. My wife tells me I never looked happier. How could I not be? Daily in contact with cows—the very symbol of the Earth—how could it not be good for the mind?