Tuesday, September 9th, 2014

Toronto, Ontario

I Turned a Corner 

As I turned a corner at Roxborough and Yonge, a middle-aged woman was standing there, waiting for, my guess was a cab.  You could tell she was curious as hell. 

In order not to appear like I had my hand in a sling (on my actual pouch for holding my meditation beads), I held my beads free in my hand.

“Are you praying?” she asked.

“Yes, it is actually for meditation.”

“Are you a priest?” 

“A monk.”

“I’ve never seen before, your clothes,” she persisted in inquisitiveness.  “I’m Catholic and from Portugal.  Are you from Canada?”

“Oh yes!  I’m a Krishna monk and I adapted to this ancient culture from India.”

“Do you get married?”

“In our tradition most priests do but I stayed single.”

She went on with her curiosity.

“Our priests don’t get married.  Sometimes they make a mistake,” she said as she swayed her head. 

I concurred and we both broke into a smile. 

“Yes, sometimes they make a mistake!”

I walked on, on that note, thinking that I do not believe I errored on my celibate life.  I had put a little walking in before speaking at a group on “The Glories of Sannyasa” which means the life of renunciation.  I asked the group to consider 18.2 from the Gita:

“The giving up of activities that are based on material desire is what great learned people call the renounced order of life (sannyasa). And giving up the results of all activities is what the wise call renunciation (tyaga).”

My message was, “At the maturing of your life when passions have been subsided to a good degree, consider renunciation.”

May the Source be with you!

5 KM