As of late, I've been spending a good deal of my time working with the Angel's Heaven orphanage in the neighborhood, near the Kathmandu Durbar Square. Run by Amrit and his wife Aishwarya, this orphanage of 20 beautiful children is badly in want of support.

A friend spotted me the other day at a wholesale grocery store near the Universal Peace Foundation office ? I spent away the last 2500 NRS I had to get the children food for the upcoming days. 30 kilos of rice, 10 kilos of flat rice, 5 kilos of mung dal, sugar and oil respectively, and a kilo of tea and mixed beans each, and at the crux of time ? Amrit has a trekking office, but the season is now at rock bottom, owing both to weather and the current political situation in Nepal.

Some friends, inspired by the example, have chosen to hop onboard and do the same. The children need an average of 12 kilos of rice and 1 kilo of dal per day, in addition with some vegetables. Much is in plans for providing steady future sustenance for this small but beautiful and very meaningful project.

We've been painting at the orphanage also. This old guest house, now rented for the orphanage, is in need of renovation to provide for an inspiring environment for the little angels. Manue and Bikash have been lending their artist's hand to fill the walls with flowers, vines, fruits and other beauties of nature. The top floor roof needs repairs to get past the ongoing monsoon season, and a new 2000 liter water tank also needs to be purchased.

Much is to be done, then! I got a draft of the website today ? thanks Manue! ? and it should go online momentarily with more specifics on the running expenses and development prospects for the orphanage.

Anyone touched by the prospect is cordially welcome to contribute ? in however small and grand way ? to the cause. To give an example, 12 kilos of rice costs 850 NRS (8.50e) ? here even little goes a long way! I will be posting more details in the days to come. In the meantime, feel free to get in touch with me if the above sparks an interest.

In reference to the previous blog, Pretty Woman, my pal jijaji just sent me a note, asking me to tell the fanatics he is an Osho lover. And that we quasi-tantric, rugged punks get the best chicks of the block.

There's a Finnish pop-song from the 80s, "Miksi naiset aina rakastuvat renttuihin?" ? "Why do Women Always Fall in Love with Rats". (Juliet Jonesin syd?n)

"They fall in love with long-haired hoodlums,
deceptive wanderers,
And cloud castle builders,
dreaming work-avoiders..."

That's pretty full on to the mark I suppose...

"And that is what worries me,
That worries me with this,
What's gonna happen to us good men..."

A friend of mine, Bikram, is actually running a branch of an Osho-center here in Thamel, Kathmandu. I need to spend more time with him, he's a gem of a person. He's been inviting me to come and participate in the programs he is doing.

I have never really checked Osho out. I need to grab a book or two and give them a read. Even if I've never gotten the impression of his being overly profound, I like radical thinkers. And Osho qualifies for one.

Rock on, Ananda! Or so he told me...

Pretty woman, walking down the street
Pretty woman, the kind I like to meet...

It's a pity the world wasn't made of neuters. Would have solved many problems. Instead, we have to keep coping with the cumbersome men and women business. Ick.

After the start of my grand journey towards the unknown, some friends have been trying to keep track of my moves. Poor saps, they and their guesswork, juicy visions patched together from data that is fragmented at best.

One of them said somewhere else the other day:

"Let then also Ananda's desires be fulfilled. Quite a buzz is indeed going on at Facebook, girl after girl, each prettier than the other, seem to already be flocking around him."

I suppose that is true. Dozens of pretty girls (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12) have stopped by recently to check out the new life of this Indiana Jones of Spirituality (huh?) of Finland fame.

Pretty woman, look my way
Pretty woman, say you'll stay with me...

So do I like women? Yea, I suppose I do like women. In contrast with men, I like them a great deal in fact. The raving, brutal male sexual impulse and the psychological distortions it gives rise to repel me, indeed I find them repulsive, the ego and the cunning selfishness it emanates.

My years of intense meditative sadhana in the cosmic drama of Radha and Krishna, conceiving of myself as a young maiden in their midst, in this heaven-world of Goloka, gave me much time to contemplate on my feminine side, planting roots of psychological balance and broader insight into human nature.

It is perhaps owing to this, in part it is anyway, that I often find women having a much richer and more profound spiritual take on reality. An emphatic touch with an abundance of heart, not just the cold logic frozen philosopher's brain. My current inner core is much more at home with the former of the couplet, grown away from the cold, intellectual ego I once clad myself in, one that many of you are sadly familiar with.

So yes, I do like women, and for many reasons. Ask me about it.

Those pretty girls at Facebook are, by the way, 95% old friends either from my school days or otherwise from almost a decade back from the Krishna circles of Finland. And I have a pretty little sister, too, cute like a strawberry. I don't think any of my girlfriends have registered at Facebook yet.

What do I see
Is she walking back to me
Yeah, she's walking back to me
Oh, oh, Pretty woman...

Aho! Pretty woman...

Some evolutions since the last time around, taking BeliefNet's Belief-O-Matic. Frankly I wasn't expecting Theravada to show up first, I assumed my views to be too cynical and universal to get a proper orthodox score. It's a wonder in its own right that anything crossed the 90% line! Among the interesting movers since May 2004:

Rising:
Theravada: 59% -> 100 %
Mahayana: 90% -> 99%
Taoism: 43% -> 77%
Nontheist: 16% -> 40%
Secular Humanism: 29% -> 57%

I wonder what marked the 1% difference between Theravada and Mahayana! I suppose I am a bit of a transvehicular hitch-hiker. Shared field with Tao is steadily growing; the integrated flow of the universe is more vivid by the day. Nontheism is nontheism, which I suppose is a milder way to say atheism, and secular humanism is, well, secular humanism.

Falling:
Hinduism: 100% -> 69%
Sikhism: 94% -> 70%
Islam: 45% -> 30%
Baha'i Faith: 65% -> 45%
Orthodox Judaism: 64% -> 43%

Hinduism took an unavoidable dive with god-concepts and ritualism reassessed, Sikhism, Islam, Baha'I and Judaism following its trail. You can't really start explaining to the quiz machine how the god-symbols, skillfully understood and stripped of anthropomorphic superimposition, parallel the enlightenment, the emptiness and the absolute of non-theistic traditions. Understood at face value, the theistic symbols can at times be less than helpful. Understood on a meta-level, the boundaries between theism and non-theism begin to disintegrate.

Of course, responding to series of questions with narrow options can only yield a result with limited nuances, missing details that can turn the lists upside down. For example, with Islam ranked at 30% in the test, there are yet aspects of it that rank it, as a method of cultivation, quite well on my scale, and we are not talking about Sufi, but plain old Islam. Roman Catholic and Orthodox traditions, the desert fathers' heritage and all, also deserve a higher place on the carts.

May 2008:

1. Theravada Buddhism (100%)
2. Mahayana Buddhism (99%)
3. Neo-Pagan (88%)
4. Jainism (82%)
5. Unitarian Universalism (80%)
6. New Age (78%)
7. Taoism (77%)
8. Liberal Quakers (73%)
9. Sikhism (70%)
10. Hinduism (69%)
11. New Thought (60%)
12. Secular Humanism (57%)
13. Reform Judaism (56%)
14. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (55%)
15. Orthodox Quaker (55%)
16. Scientology (54%)
17. Bah?'? Faith (45%)
18. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (44%)
19. Orthodox Judaism (43%)
20. Nontheist (40%)
21. Islam (30%)
22. Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (30%)
23. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (23%)
24. Seventh Day Adventist (20%)
25. Eastern Orthodox (20%)
26. Roman Catholic (20%)
27. Jehovah's Witness (10%)

May 2004:

1. Hinduism (100%)
2. Sikhism (94%)
3. Mahayana Buddhism (90%)
4. Neo-Pagan (87%)
5. Unitarian Universalism (77%)
6. Jainism (68%)
7. New Age (68%)
8. Bah?'? Faith (65%)
9. Orthodox Judaism (64%)
10. Liberal Quakers (61%)
11. Reform Judaism (61%)
12. Theravada Buddhism (59%)
13. New Thought (52%)
14. Scientology (48%)
15. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (46%)
16. Islam (45%)
17. Taoism (43%)
18. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (34%)
19. Orthodox Quaker (34%)
20. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (32%)
21. Secular Humanism (29%)
22. Eastern Orthodox (29%)
23. Roman Catholic (29%)
24. Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (26%)
25. Seventh Day Adventist (21%)
26. Jehovah's Witness (20%)
27. Nontheist (16%)

Ego, the ever-vigilant and constantly self-asserting pseudo-self, forms the heart of our troubled existence. Today being the 28th anniversary of my present incarnation in a long series of egotic absorptions, I can think of no subject more suitable to touch on than that of the ego.

We've all been subjected to sermons detailing how we aren't this body. Some may be familiar with the Vedantic theory of five koshas, or layers, that form the conditioned entity. Others may be more familiar with the Buddhist theory of five skandhas, or aggregates, that similarly make up the conditioned being.

That's all fine as a theory. Yet where the ego has self-enthroned itself, the mental faculties function in an inherently self-serving manner. There is little real solace to be found in the theoretical mastery of the ego-theory — even the subtlest contemplations are transmutated into ego-fuel with wondrous ease.

We are best familiar with the flavor of ego that sustains us in the identity of a master of sensual and mental enjoyments, the gross ego-stereotype that is first highlighted as the non-self in many spiritual traditions. However, while there is an ego at the heart of the enjoyer, there is also an ego of the escaper.

While the ego of the escaper, the noble spiritualist, is of a finer grade than that of the materialist, it is not beyond being able to generate formidable levels of existential delusion. Assuming one is firm in conscious cultivation, the spiritually progressive ego will eventually resolve itself with the rise of penetrating wisdom. In the interim, it is fundamentally venomous, just as its dark counterpart is.

There are countless angles from which to explore the spiritual ego problem. While I cannot lay claim to having mastered the problem, I have over a decade of ego-driven spirituality under my belt, and with it a fair sense of its foul taste — even if the depth of it all has began dawning on me only quite recently.

At the heart of reality, there is no permanent self to be found. The co-arising and interdependent flow of mind-matter generates a sense of an individual self that lies at the root of the drama, a dreamy focal point of action, a shabby ego-entity that perpetually seeks to reinforce its own sense of reality, protecting the viscosity of the conglomerate entity from the tear of the constantly rising and falling phenomena it consists of.

For one reason or another, it wasn't your lot to become a successful world-enjoyer. Leave the lime-lights, the arena of gross materialism. Become a spiritual hero, a transcendent conqueror, an ego-entity conceiving of itself as a creature of light and goodness. Pride yourself in your integrity, in your benevolence, in your quest, in your nobility of purpose. You are real, your spirituality is real, and the world you inhabit is real. Build that prison of light, bind yourself with goodness.

Aho, he becomes the compassionate helper of fellow seekers. Aho, he becomes the tireless servant of the teacher. Aho, he becomes a knower of the rites and the scripture. Aho, he becomes a symbol of spirituality. Aho, he becomes a world-teacher, he becomes a savior, and he becomes an avatar. Aho, he becomes an emphasized one that is contrasted with others, and so the cage of light grows firmer.

The whole concept of striving for an attainment is a facade. There is no light, nor is there darkness. There is no substance in bondage, nor in liberation. Dualities born of the mind will vanish with the mind. With the disappearance of the eye, light and darkness evaporate. With the disappearance of the ego-conception, labels of spirit and matter fade.

There is only plain reality, and plain reality doesn't seek to assert itself, nor does it invite you to project over it a hundred dreams, to feel of it in a thousand ways, or to conceptualize it into millions of carefully crafted divisions. The interdependent and self-contained flow of aggregates just flows. It seeks no second to assert its flowing.

But alas, the ego is busy in its attempts to manipulate the flow in a manner serving its hallucinations. What comes of its own accord is perfect and natural — but not for the ego, for the ego feeds on contrasts. Attachments and aversions, pleasures and pains, the momentum of arising dualities and the subsequent involved emotion-conceptualization exchange contribute to the sense of reality the ego seeks to establish and guard.

Desirelessness and disinvolvement from anything not presenting itself of its own accord is the venom of venoms for the ego, provided one is skillful enough to not let the ego seize these qualities as medals of spiritual valor on the chest of its proud uniform, turning them into a show of spirituality and again embarking on a delusory trip of delving on contrasts.

Wisdom in its very core is nothing but the absence of delusions. There is no active wisdom as such in the ultimate, no wisdom-concept-processor to keep itself busy generating a profound interplay of wiseness. Wisdom is nothing but plain perception of nature, non-involved experience of the suchness of existence.

In eliminating the spiritual ego, fatalism and nihilism are two very real enemies raising their ugly heads. Fatalism and nihilism are conquered by profound mindfulness growing from repeated trials, trials meeting both success and failure. Fortunately, there is ultimately no-one of any impact to register our progress — the path is ours alone to walk, and we have all the time in the world to do it.

Facing the facts can be a disorienting experience, but it is also a fountain of supreme peace. The absurdity of the resilient ego-projection we are enmeshed in is in fact a matter of great humor. I often find myself laughing at myself, the many attempted personae, and the extensions of the process in the form of countless emanations and excrements, this very writing before your eyes one among many such curiosities.