http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfS_U22FVyw
It has been one week and I have learned so much from the children here in Chiang Mai, Thailand. What a different world these kids survive in. You have to grow up fast here, for the harsh realities of life seem to come at the speed of light. I have seriously met five-year-old kids here who are more independent than teenagers I know in America. Just the other night I watched a child set up a stand to sell purses at the market place. She was no older than six. I watched her in the distance as we played with other children. She was all alone the entire time. As we were leaving I saw her break down the stand and go about her way. Could you imagine first of all a six-year-old left unattended in America anywhere, and secondly, of all places at a flea market? For that truly is the equivalent to what these night markets are like.
It’s a more simple way of life here. Food, shelter and clothes are the essentials. I’ve been giving some of the kids some Mentos singles candies that I picked up from the store. This has been the key to my first impression with these kids. The idea came from the Spirit giving me Himself and wanting nothing in return. A free gift… There has not been a child yet who did not want to play with me after receiving the candy. To the boys, you would think I just bought them a brand new PlayStation with a 46 inch T.V. to play it on. To the girls, you would think that I just bought them a brand new pony with a pink saddle on top. It’s a hard candy that lasts no longer than two minutes before dissolving in one’s mouth.
At the slums, I watched how well these children would play together. We brought a soccer ball, Frisbee, and a skateboard today. I watched these kids take turns playing with our toys. I watched the older ones not grab toys from the younger ones, but rather get the younger kids involved. When someone was ready to ride the skateboard they would get the attention on whoever had it, say something in Thai, then wait patiently until it was their turn (which was never a long wait). I watched how fast they learned. Our translator informed me that these kids have never seen a skateboard before. Within two hours these broods were doing turns and wheelies all by themselves. My homeboy, Doe-Soy, is five. He watched me “rainbow” the soccer ball when we first arrived. As we were leaving he got my attention and literally did a flawless rainbow. It wasn’t just me who was shocked by how quickly he mastered this trick. His boys were stunned too. I can’t stop thinking about how fast these kids learn. But at the same time I can’t stop thinking of how much of they would not have learned if it was not modeled for them…if someone had not taught them…if someone had not come along and shown them.
Here’s what I am starting to understand. Everyone is born with the spirit of truth inside of them. He’s already there. We don’t have to work for it, buy it, or wait till we’re a certain age, or go into a building for it to be accessed. We simply have to wake up. The difference between children and us is simple; we don’t seem to want to be unconditionally happy. We don’t seem to want to experience joy. Somewhere along the way in our journey through adolescence we tone that spirit out. In fact we even rename it all together; we label it our “conscious.” No longer do we have child-like faith. No longer do we have an attitude of openness to learn. No longer are we selfless but rather we become selfish. We begin to want other things. We want to be happy “only if” that means we have this and that. In other words, we are saying, “You are my happiness.” If we don’t get what we want we refuse to be happy. It’s not that we don’t want to experience joy, it’s just that we can’t imagine being happy without all these things that we hold so dear to us. We’ve been taught to place our happiness in these things. Here’s some truth I’ve experienced, happiness does not last because our conditions change. Our conditions change because change is inevitable. We must unlearn if we want to truly come awake; which to me is the same thing as saying, if we want to love, if we want freedom, if we want joy, peace, if we want spirituality, we have things to unlearn. In that sense spirituality is the most practical thing in the whole world. What would be more real-world than spirituality as I have defined it. Not religion, not worship, not good deeds or charitable acts, but spirituality – waking up! I mean seriously, you don’t have to come to Thailand to see the heartache all around. You don’t have to leave your neighborhood to look at the loneliness. You don’t have to go to work to feel fear. You don’t have to go to school to experience the confusion, the conflicts in the hearts of people, both inner conflict and outer conflict. It’s all around us.
But what if someone came along and showed a way of getting rid of all that? What if someone personally gave you a way to stop that incredible drainage of energy, of wellbeing, of emotions that comes from your conditioned state? Would you even want that? Suppose someone showed us a way that we could truly love one another and be at peace with each other? Can you think of anything more practical, more real-life than that? I can’t. But instead, we have people thinking big businesses are more practical, that politics are more practical, that science and mathematics are more practical, that making more babies is more practical, that being the best at this and that is more practical. Think about this, what’s the point of sending a man to the moon when “we” can’t even live well on Earth?
I am not here to change these kids. I’m not here to fix them or teach them anything they do not already know. I am not here to perfect anyone on my team, or lecture them in what they are doing wrong or right. I am not here to say a lot of great words (which most people wouldn’t be able to translate anyway). And the last thing I am trying to do through this blog is pressure you as my readers to change in anyway. What I am here to do is dance my dance and sing my song. I am here to be love…to be the body of Christ…to be Christ with skin on. If you profit, fine. If you do not, that’s fine too. I can only do what the Spirit of Truth asks of me. As I obey, He does the rest. As much as I would like to take all of these kids home with me at the end of 11 months, they are not mine. They are His who created them and it is up to them, just like it is up to us, to decide if we want to wake up or not.
