Dashboard Buddha: Jon Stewart Edition

"Jesters do oft prove prophets.”

--Regan, King Lear Act V, Scene III

Fig.1 American Buddha?

I read somewhere that to take the Buddhist path requires developing a sense of humor. Humor helps you let go of pride, laughter erodes ego. Obviously, that went a long way with me. Laughter is my drug of choice. I laugh so heartily and consistently every morning and evening watching my favorite shows that my sister’s quaker parrot learned to perfectly imitate my chortles of joy. If I don’t get boisterous at least once a day, I feel stagnant. Heart half-full. If I can laugh all the way to enlightenment, then show me the way.

Jon Stewart has said in a few interviews that a person’s sense of humor only goes as far as their ideology. He explains that sometimes people come up to him and say they love his show and think he’s hysterical except for the time when he made a joke about global warming. Or abortion or foreign policy or last night’s episode of American Idol.

The Buddha says “Attachment causes suffering.” People get offended about things they have a personal affinity for, their attachment to it sucks out all the humor, and they suffer in the form of anger or resentment.

Why do Creationists want to discredit evolution so much? Why do scientists roll their eyes at the idea of intelligent design? Why do Man U fans verbally abuse Chelsea fans at football games? Why did I despise Tina Fey with relish when I heard she dissed Jon Stewart even though it was clearly taken out of context and she doesn’t actually harbor any ill will toward the man in any shape or form except perhaps a bit of envy that he’s so much more iconoclastic and clever and influential than she?


Fig.2 Rescue me from ignorance

Each party feels that the Other holds sacred certain ideas that encroach upon beliefs. Our beliefs, which we hold so dear, are very personal and we perceive them as an extension of ourselves. If someone attacks our beliefs, it’s an attack on our own existence.

As self-proclaimed “equal opportunity satirists,” Jon and his Daily Show crew have ripped into everything. Nothing is sacred except the almighty Laugh. He’s the classical court jester: the only person (simply by virtue of being the Fool) allowed to call out the King by poking comedic holes in his actions and policies. The Fool has very little ego and frequently depreciates himself with pratfalls, laughter, and general tomfoolery. He doesn’t care about his reputation.


Fig.3 Make fun of thyself

A speaker on the Path of the Ekayana podcast once concluded that Buddhism has a joke at its heart. One of the speaker’s teachers—one who always seemed to have a little smirk on his face—said that when you become enlightened (that is, once you don’t care about ego), you get all the jokes. Ultimately, that’s what Buddhism is: getting all the jokes. Everyone should aspire to be the Fool.

That said, everyone should care.

I wasn’t intending to sound cryptic. The best things in Buddhism come in Yoda koans.

The Fool, in fact, does care. He may even care more than anyone else. The trick is to hold that caring like an egg in the grip of the mind. He holds it gently and considers it in its entirety. He holds it long enough to find the flaws and cracks, then remembers that the egg is not an extension of himself. He is not the egg. He is not the anger or worry or disgust. The egg is there to spur the insight to learn or to take action... or make a joke.


Fig.4 All in a jester's day's work

The Buddha once told his monk buddies that they should use his teachings as a raft they leave behind as soon as it’s fulfilled its usefulness. You don’t haul a raft out of the river to cross a desert. The raft would be heavy and would just drag behind you and people would question your sanity. Similarly, if the Fool continues to carry the egg, it starts to rot and people tend to avoid him and his odoriferousness.

But the Fool is no fool. He extracts the joke, then promptly tosses the egg away. It smashes against the wall and everyone laughs. We laugh at impermanence because we inherently know that it’s silly to think anything lasts forever. We laugh at our false perception that an egg can survive being thrown at the wall. We laugh at our false perception that our problems will never end.

Laughter is a little piece of enlightenment, and if Jon Stewart teaches us nothing else, it's that fact.


Fig.5 Simpsonified

The Amish got it goin' on

“You can preach a better sermon with your life than with your lip.”
-Amish proverb


Fig.1 All work and some play makes an Amish boy

The Amish don’t have podcasts. Can you believe that shit? I would love to hear the serene tones of Pennsylvania Dutch accents expound upon quilting techniques and tips on how to avoid tourists trying to take their photographs.

If you’ve seen Witness, you’ve seen half of what decent pop culture has to offer regarding the Amish. Devil’s Playground is the other half, and it’s illuminating cinema to say the least. It’s a documentary about the tradition of rumspringa, the time in an Amish teenager’s life when they are allowed to explore and experience the “English” world outside their insulated farming communities. The purpose of this is related to the old Anabaptist/Mennonite belief that a baby cannot be properly baptized. A person has to make a willful, adult decision to have communion with God, so the kids are allowed to see what their options are before being encouraged to return and focus on entering the community.

Devil’s Playground first outlines the basics of Amish Mennonite life, then follows around a handful of Amish kids on their rumspringa. During this time, wide-eyed kids go out to parties, dance and drink too much, drive around in cars, and sometimes take drugs. Very few decide that the outside life is for them, reflecting the high retention rate (between 80-90%) among the Amish denominations. Pretty awesome for a group who don’t include medicare or any government benefits whatsoever. The super-fast barn-raising thing, though… FEMA would’ve benefited from utilizing that sort of community work ethic.

Fig.2 Harrison Ford is too sexy for his pockets

The Amish don’t join the military, but they don’t apply for Social Security benefits either. No phones, electricity, or fancy clothes. They’re as “off the grid” as anyone can get. On the surface, the rules against things as banal as buttons seem odd, but what I found most appealing about the Amish is their sound reasoning behind everything they do or don’t do. Shirt pockets aren’t allowed because there’s the possibility you can put a flower or other pretty trinket in there, which can lead to pride. The ego-loathing Buddhist in me can’t argue with that logic.

Another thing is that they’re willing to make very small accommodations when new technology comes along. Gas-powered tilling machines, for example, are allowed in some Amish communities, but they’ll strip the wheels of the rubber tires because the rubber makes working the fields too easy and a sudden increase in ease could lead to laziness and lack of appreciation for hard work. They don’t have phones in their houses because it decreases sense of community by reducing face-to-face communication. Phones are also looked upon as an intrusion of the outside world, which interrupts daily life. I couldn’t agree with that one more. Being Amish is almost worth it not to have telemarketers call ten minutes into every DVD you start watching.

Those Amish DVD players, by the way, fueled by the alcohol they don’t drink.

Fig.3 Light switches: overrated

Technology jokes aside, the Amish have got it goin’ on. They are old school devoted Christians. They live the holy life to a T. You remember how they handled that schoolhouse shooting in Lancaster County in ‘06? They not only thought no ill of the guy who killed five of their young daughters and injured five more, they went to his home and comforted his widow and family. I bow to the Amish. They get it. They know how to live a life of purpose: to make the most awesome peanut butter pie on the planet. Okay, that’s not their entire life’s pursuit, but if you’ve ever been to Yoder’s restaurant in Sarasota, you might be convinced it is.

Fig.4 They do believe in watching cable

Whenever I see my father operate one of his numerous coffee machines, the bit of Amish in me rears its simple head. He has this one multi-purpose monster that makes lattes, espresso, and regular coffee, all through the inclusion of an extravagant quantity of little plastic “pods” filled with perfectly pre-measured coffee grounds and powdered milk. It’s fast and easy and looks so Star Trek-like with its futuristic minimum brain-power procedure. Juxtaposed against my old-school pour-boiling-water-into-a-cup-and-add-tea-leaves-and-wait-for-five-minutes breakfast ritual, his method of caffeine intake appears insanely wasteful. Tastes great, I’ll be the first to admit, but anti-Amish.

If we happen to be in the kitchen at the same time at the morning hour, I repeat my Amish-inspired mantra, “If it’s too easy, it’s not worth doing.”


Fig.5 True rebellion

This didn’t apply to my orchid-avoidance in my gardening activities, though. I wrote them off as too high-maintenance and I prefer the relatively well-adjusted African violets in my bathroom. That is, at least, until my sister gifted me three beautiful orchids that I have managed to care for so well that I coaxed a flower spike out of one of them in only five months. And guess what? It was totally worth it. I am addicted to the motherly kind of pride I get whenever a spike appears on one of my orchids, and witnessing the blooming bud weeks later is more sweet than the iced tea from Texan Wal-Marts.

Now I’m full of pride. Crap. I will make up for it by ridding myself of buttons.

We all take the rubber off our tractor wheels in our own ways—I make fancy tea the long way and my Dad prefers to sketch his interior design drawings by hand instead of with some expensive computer software—but we mostly leave the tires on in everyday situations. We’re Americans, after all. Not that the Amish aren’t Americans, but they may be too good at Christianity.

Vegan Week

"In the strict scientific sense we all feed on death - even vegetarians."
-Mr. Spock, Star Trek, "Wolf in the Fold"

Fig.1 Have you hugged a chicken today?

One sunny Floridian January Saturday, I drove up to Gainesville to hang out with my friend Casey and meet his boyfriend Joseph for the first time. We checked on the community events for the day and unanimously decided to attend the Hoggetown Medieval Festival. Of course, we had to find a place to eat beforehand, since Joseph is vegan and ren faires are not well known to serve up anything more vegan than giant roasted turkey legs. Luckily, it’s as easy to find a vegan-friendly eatery in a college town as it is to find a coffeehouse in a college town. At the fest, while perusing the numerous vendor tents drinking our mead (vegan!) and scoffing at the bevy of overwrought Scottish accents floating into our ears, theology got injected into the conversation. I have no idea how.

“I consider veganism my religion,” he said.

“Really?”

“Lots of people write in their religion as veganism on the census.”

Veganism is a religion? I’m so there.

Fig.2 They also call loved ones "Agave nectar" instead of "Honey"

Thus, Vegan Week was born. Now, I can do Vegetarian Week standing on my head. Since I started doing Buddhism, I’ve been observing Vesak--the holiday that celebrates the birth, enlightenment, and nirvana of Gautama Buddha--by avoiding meat for the week leading up it. Plus, I renounce meat on full and new moons. And I don’t tend to eat meat all that much anyways.

I’m not addicted to meat, is what I’m saying.

But veganism is a lot of work. I spent a few weeks beforehand researching how vegans sidestep and tip-toe around consuming animal products. Mulling over concepts like incorporating organic alfalfa sprouts, fermented soy tofu, and textured vegetable protein to meals, I paused the way people do when they know they’ve just stepped in dogshit and don’t want to move for fear of hearing that aromatic moist sucking sound you get when you lift your sneaker. But when I picked up my foot and started walking again, collecting recipes that sounded exotic and tasty, I found there was no unpleasant odor clinging to my sole.

Sure, I couldn’t eat anything from the box of Godiva chocolates I had just gotten for Valentine’s Day or sprinkle grated Parmesan cheese on my beloved Italian dishes or dump a little whole milk in my chai tea every morning, but I was going to survive. If it’s good enough for Emily Deschanel (girlcrush!), then it’s good enough for me.

I’m addicted to dairy products, I guess is what I’m saying.

Fig.3 I count broccoli myself

My sister volunteered to take the vegan plunge along with me, so, armed with a list and some recipes, we went to Publix and the Green Bean organic market to gather supplies. We surprised ourselves at how quickly the flip-the-box-to-parse-the-ingredients-list obligation instilled itself into everyday life. I would zero in on the tiny type and wag my finger at any evidence that animals sacrificed their lives or comforts in the making of that product. Whey? Exploits milk cows. Egg whites? Exploits chickens. Honey? Exploits bees. Non-dairy creamer powder? Contains milk derivatives. “Non-dairy” my ass.

We got soy yogurt and soy milk, which we’ve had before and generally enjoy. We made sure to avoid butter and only use olive oil or corn oil for cooking (again, not a big issue). We’re already big fans of nearly every variety of beans (fava, by the way, look and taste like cockroaches, FYI), so we made hummus to use as a sandwich spread for lunches. We also picked up some things we had to learn to prepare, like tofu, bean sprouts, seitan and tempeh.

We had Portobello mushroom Parmesan on spaghetti with crunchy fried tempeh instead of meat crumbles. I made veggie burritos, tofu-cashew curry, and even discovered that vegan brownies taste even more chocolatey than regular ones. Tofutti ice cream, though, is a sad excuse for dessert, sorry to say. And Joseph warned me against “vegan cheese” which not even he would touch. In the end, we survived just fine. It was a challenge, but we came out of it better for doing it, and we learned some new favorite recipes (vegan waffles ROCK) that we’d happily eat outside of Vegan Week.

When our little experiment concluded, I decided that I could never deny my inherent foodie sensibility and significantly limit my intake of the myriad dishes this world has to offer my widely varied palate, but I am apt to expand my meatless options and explore the tastes of vegan cooking. It's always fun to try new recipes, and it's just plain good karma.

Fig.4 Contrary to popular myth, vegan food does not taste like this

One of Joseph’s favorite Simpsons episodes, appropriately enough, is “Lisa the Vegetarian,” in which Lisa realizes that the only difference between the lamb at the petting zoo and the lamb chop for dinner is that one spent two hours in the broiler. Her refusal to dissect an earthworm and inquiries into school lunch policies triggers Principal Skinner into screening an educational video from the Meat Council for the class. Troy McClure gives a little boy a tour of the beef industry, showing off the high-density feedlots and the killing floor of a slaughterhouse, leaving the little boy trembling and emotionally disturbed. When the video is over, the class is treated to a pile of tripe to snack on.

In all my life, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more masterful evisceration of the beef industry, much less satirized in a wildly popular television show. Read Fast Food Nation or watch Food Inc., and you’ll admit that The Simpsons didn’t exaggerate at all.

At one point in the Meat Council video Lisa is force-fed, Troy McClure displays a chart of the food chain. The image is a drawing of a few dozen wild animals, all with arrows pointing straight at the human drawn in the center, proving that eating meat is totally normal and just part of the natural order of things. And if we're totally honest with ourselves, you have to agree with Mr. Spock on this. Things have to die so we can survive.

This is not propaganda. Humans are omnivores and have evolved to eat both flora and fauna. Our cranial capacity developed as a result of hunting animals, which takes a lot more brain power than picking berries. If our ancestors didn’t eat meat, we wouldn’t be half as smart as we are today. Smart enough, in fact, to make choices about what we cram in our mouths. Vegan Week taught me my own gustatory boundaries and how to explore them, and while I may not be cut out for a completely animal-free diet, I am certainly more aware of how to be educated and judicious about what I consume.

Awareness is what distinguishes an enlightened mind. Christians are working to be aware of Jesus’ love. Muslims practice to be aware of the will of God. Jews believe it’s a duty to be aware of God’s presence. Hindus are occupied with being aware of the divine within each person. Vegans try their best to be aware of our connection to all living things and choose to treat them with the same respect we give to our human race.

That's as good a religion as any.


Fig.5 I agree

Everyday Hinduism, or How to order bindis from India

"In memories of her beloved, life is restless with longing.
He's in the bindi on my forehead.
He's in the sleepiness of my lashes."
-from the song "Dola Re Dola," Devdas


Fig.1 Oooooh shiny

'Twas a hot summer day in 2006 when my best friend Connie and I went to Islands of Adventure in Orlando. As is typical whenever we go to theme parks together, we were feeling adventurous and decided to work up the courage to hit the rollercoasters. Having grown up in central Florida, we had our share of hours on various thrill rides at Busch Gardens, Sea World, Disney, EPCOT, Animal Kingdom, and Universal Studios, but had never really taken advantage of the superior rides at IOA. Once we survived (and loved!) the Dueling Dragons, we were gung-ho for The Hulk and actually returned to the Dragons for a second time.

Somewhere in there, though, we stopped in at one of the Lost Civilization Island’s fantasy bazaar (now refurbished into Harry Potter World, or whatever), where all the shops are made up to look like they were lifted straight from Aladdin. Of course, I found the tent hawking the overpriced bellydancing supplies and fawned over the jingly belts and earrings and costumes I would never buy outside of a Renaissance Faire (much better deals). But I did pick up a small packet of multicolored bindis and promptly shared them with Connie. I wore a pink one and she wore blue, to coordinate with our t-shirt colors. We felt extra pretty walking around all day with our foreheads so adorned, but little did I know this one impulse purchase would lead to a new personal fashion habit that continues to this day.

Fig.2 Bollywood Babe Wannabe sighting in Key West

A few weeks later, I brought the same set of bindis with me on a week-long family trip to Key West. Key West, being Key West, is the provenance of all things kitsch and casual in my beloved state of Florida. Art shops, pirate jewelry sellers, pizza parlours, creperies, Margaritaville, Sloppy Joe’s, the Hog’s Breath Saloon—all bathed in the colors of the setting sun and neon signs. Almost everything we ate was seafood or was impregnated with key lime the same way everything on Dune is impregnated with Spice. It’s warm and inviting, but small and colorful and comforting, and you get the feeling that after dark, anything goes on Duval Street. There are kitschy restaurant bars every 50 feet, trinket shops in between, and streetside kiosks offering henna tattoos. It was just the kind of place I could wear my bindis, buy a sari (which I did), and walk around wearing both without feeling out of place.

When I got home, the bindis stuck, but I soon realized that they have an expiration date. The glue doesn’t hold out for long, and they get cruddy after a few weeks of constant use.

Fig.3 That's a SERIOUS Bindi

"Bindi" means “dot” in Sanskrit. Originally, they signified age, marriage, and/or religious affiliation, depending on who was wearing one (yes, even men wear the mark of sindoor on holy occasions). Traditional ones were simply crimson or yellow vermillion powder applied to the forehead during temple ceremonies or everyday home shrine puja offerings. The placement is meant to represent the ajna chakra, known as the center of insight and wisdom. The color red also represents the femenine power of the goddesses Sati and Parvati, and women who wear this tilak ("mark") will receive their blessings.

After years of watching Hindi movies (I promise a post on that soon!), I had seen every shape and size of bindi worn by hot Bollywood actresses, and it was just a matter of time before I decided that I wanted a piece of that action. Sometimes they wore them, sometimes they didn’t, and sometimes they wore big gaudy ones for special occasions.


Fig.4 Aishvarya Rai pimpin' her bindi in the movie Devdas

South Asian women in modern times treat the bindi as any other piece of jewelry or fashion accessory, no matter what their social status or association. As a result, they now come in an eye-popping array of styles, as I soon discovered when I went online to search for an internet site that sold them. Bindis come in every color to match your outfit and every size and shape to suit your occasion. They come plain or encrusted with crystals, pearls, and metallic accents.

The first site I ordered from sent me a small slightly battered package a few weeks later. It was a box wrapped in white cloth, sewed up with thread, my address was written in blue marker on the top, and it was slapped with a customs declaration certificate from Vastrapur Ahmedabad, India. It certainly looked like it had come from halfway around the world. Pretty wild, right?


Fig.5 We're not in Delhi anymore, Toto

I have since tried other sites as well, and one, Visionsofindia.com, hails from California, so my packages come much more quickly. Now, I’ll purchase between eight and ten new little packets of bindis every three months or so, so I get to try new styles all the time. I wear them everyday, every time I go out. It’s as obligatory as earrings or a necklace and I feel naked if I forget to put one on. The websites sell skin-safe bindi glue, but I’ve found that eyelash glue works very well, too. I have quite a collection, and I use the old ones to fancify picture frames or bedazzle some other craft I may be creating.
I’ve been lucky that my employer has no objection to my little quirk. Sometimes I think that they think it’s a strictly religious thing, and what with all the Islamic hijab-related school uniform debates in the news, they don’t want to be sued for discrimination. They don’t care about my tiny gold nose stud either, which is even more innocuous than the bindis, but complements my overall recherché Indian fashion so well that neither register as especially unusual.

Early on, my good friends got used to it immediately, calling it “such a Caity thing.” Given that they’ve witnessed my long history of hair and jewelry-related personal fashion kicks through the years, bindi-wearing was an organic development.


Fig.6 Another trademark "Caity Thing"

The most frequent inquiry from co-workers or random people standing in line at the cash register is about whether or not it’s a piercing, and I have to explain that it’s really just a snazzy sticker. I also get asked whether it “means something,” and I say that for me, it’s just something pretty, and what girl doesn’t like a little something extra sparkly to wear? I also clarify the ancient versus modern interpretation of its significance, and I feel happy that I’ve injected a bit of world culture into someone’s day.

When I’m out in places full of people who don’t work with me everyday and are incidentally immune to the oddity of bindis, I get glances and outright stares, especially from little kids who point tug at their mother’s shirt and poke at their own foreheads to communicate their absolute amazement at my facial adornment. I’ve even gotten a few bright elementary school children who correctly identify it as an “Indian” thing. They love it, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see them start running around with Dora The Explorer stick-on earrings worn on their ajna chakras.

At the end of the day, I remind myself that the Buddha wore bindis, and protecting the wisdom chakra with a bindi never hurts. The last thing I do after getting ready for the day is choose a bindi to wear, and in that way, what began as a fashion statement has evolved into religious ritual for me. The bindi does mean something to me. It’s a constant expression of my faith in beauty, wisdom, and individuality. With that definition behind the bindi, I don’t foresee my ever growing tired of it.

Fig.7 A girl has so many choices...