Midnight confession

Have you all ever experienced a love so deep that it makes you want to cry and your chest feels like it is almost about to burst? I had my share of these volcanic emotions during my prime days, and at that time, I was so overwhelmed and happy that I could feel that way. At some point, I was even egoistically proud of it. Some of my most sensitive and emotional phases have been exposed, lived, and now remodeled for better acceptance and understanding. 

I have gradually come to love without expectations. Give without always expecting the return favors. To be there for the people who stood by me even when I was a shitty person. I am no saint here, but I have come to accept things in a more gentle way. Well, that is because if it's really love, would we ever want to suffocate our loved ones with our expectations? If giving others always comes with the hopes of return favors, can it even be labelled as something genuine and pure?  If relationships come with a price tag, why not just buy from a supermarket and maybe even wait for a Black Friday discount?

I have experienced these emotions through the relationships I have built over the years of living as per the expectations of society, family, and friends. I was becoming someone what others were hoping for me to become, and not what I should have. While doing so, I have turned into someone I am not proud of. I have shouted at my loved ones when they failed me. Dozed myself to sleep, drank until dawn and cried until the last drop of tears. I slowly turned out to be the person I despised the most. My love turned into toxicity and even drove away the ones I cared about the most. I was racing towards negativity, even to the point of hating myself.

Having confessed that, I don’t regret or want to change even the slightest bit of my history. You know, even if I were given a second chance to write my story, I would have chosen the same path because if I didn’t, I would not have reached where I am right now. I didn’t win a lottery in terms of financial assets, but I surely won a lottery in terms of self-love and acceptance. I rebuilt myself for the best, and I assure you I am still trying to be a better person than I was yesterday. 

I wasn’t even religious enough until I hit my rock bottom. I only started seeking refuge in Jetsuen Drolma (Green Tara) after I was shattered. My perspectives have changed since then, and my life has become calmer and happier. Having come this far, I can now celebrate it and even laugh about it without tears this time. I just hope I can earn more positivity and be able to share the same with the people around me. 

Marriage as a means of insurance

I was strongly  influenced by the fact that new generation people are way smarter than our ancestors based on the theory of evolution. However, it seems like otherwise in terms of using marriage as a means of insurance for various purposes. 

Well, that topic has been intriguing not because of the word marriage but I was in awe thinking how smart our ancestors were even in a technologically deprived society where they solely depended on agriculture for their every day survival. 

Our professor mentioned how a family in one village prefers to marry off their sons/daughters in a village far away from their village to prevent the risk of going hungry in terms of natural disasters, which is a form of crop insurance.  Well this is because the natural disasters will not strike the two different villages at the same time and these two families tied through marriage can save each other in times of crisis. It’s amazing how the concept of insurance existed even before the actual insurance companies were born and my stupid brain thought the family wanted to handover the burden to the in-laws when they marry off their children. I am embarrassed to admit this though. 

This made me think about the arranged marriage systems which are still in practice in some parts of the world. Can this also be a kind of indirect insurance and if so what form of it? 

Even in Bhutan I believe some far flung parts of the country practices some sort of marriage insurance. I remember when I visited Laya a few years back my host shared the story of two brothers sharing one wife. They narrated how one husband goes to herd the yaks in the mountains and cannot return home for months. Hence,  the other brother stays at home doing other works to earn the income and particularly for the Layaps providing the porter service. They were even joking about the equivalency of their horses to Prado car. I didn’t realize it back then but now I can say this was also a form of insurance through the marriage especially to keep the flow of income and also the wife’s risk of becoming a widower is reduced with two husbands. It is also said that marriage within the family retains the wealth within the family only. I wonder if we still practise this kind of marriage or is it just a history now?

Would you agree that our grandparents who had a higher number of children compared to today’s generation took in marriage as an insurance to increase the number of workers to work on the farm? 

Today, forget about getting insured through marriage, most don’t even get married and there are many countries silently facing this issue. So my conclusion on this in relation to what I mentioned above is there are many insurance companies who are providing much better insurance options (hahaha). 

                        

                         

          Photo of my grandparents for they insured the family with
          8 children and now I am blessed with many cousins.

Science or religion or both

Oh how I love to take pride in being Buddhist and having faith in the existence of god. Even with such deep faith, I have no power to prove it to the eyes of people who questions it. This situation seldom occurs back home as we share the similar if not same path but it’s been different when I met someone who strongly questioned me about my faith. Challenged me with science being the ultimate answer and the ability of science to prove all most everything. 

I was taken aback because I never thought someone would belittle a religion or more so a faith because I wonder if someone even has a guide in life. The purpose of one’s existence is also questionable for someone like that(this is just my rant). At that very moment I was reminded of the words of Dzongsar Jamyang Khenste Rinpoche where he mentioned that people following the religious path tries to understand and learn science and but he has never heard of any science people trying to understand religion. 

Well, this encounter just validated Rinpoche’s statement and I chose to remain silent.

Maybe I am culturally prejudiced for having such a strong opinion but it’s also in my faith not to make fun of other’s beliefs even if I can’t accommodate their thoughts. Well even if I can’t add in more motivating comments, I fake it to be at least a quiet listener. 

People maybe educated through the count of certificates but what’s the purpose if one have not even learned to be a human, human in the sense a decent one. It’s confusing and all words I have acquired through my education can’t even express my dilemma here. Maybe I am just fumed because I couldn’t even explain my perspective. 

This was my first encounter with an atheists and I must say it wasn’t pleasing yet I am glad for the encounter for I got a differing perspective on things and I won’t be perplexed the next time. I may even be able to give a polite response.

Do you think perspectives are a mere reflection of one self?