Straight to the point . . .

I have more work than I wish I had, so let's go directly to the challenge.


Let's reflect challenge - November : No Limits

I keep on saying I am not a religious person but I have always been very interested in spirituality and Buddhism philosophy.

I spent 6 months living in Taiwan in 1997 and I am must say that the return to Germany was very hard as I thought people were surely on the wrong path and too nervous to me. I also had some of my so called  friends inundating me with the "You changed, you need to go back as who you were" and of course I wasn't interested in that.

So it was a bit of a tough and lonely time because people didn't understand. Unfortunately, if you put a drop of red inside 10 liters of clear, the red will eventually disappear. Still there but invisible. The same happened to me, I kept some things inside me, but step by step I went back to the way Europeans live.

Thankfully, even after my return, I continued going to Taiwan for work visits. When I met Dennis he was also working for a Taiwanese company so we had many occasions to fly there together.

When we decided to get married, we wanted the ceremony to be in Taiwan. It didn't happen that way because France would have refused to recognize the marriage as legal so we ended up getting married in old good UK, but we only realized that later.

I had asked one of my friends there if she could arrange that we meet somebody and on one of our scheduled work trips, she told me that the Rinpoche she knew would be in Taiwan when we were arriving and he had agreed to meet us.. A Rinpoche is a religious teacher held in very high regard and rank among Tibetan Buddhists. It literally means "precious one," and is used to address or describe some very special Tibetan lamas .

So we went to meet him. I didn't know exactly what to expect, sometimes you meet people and you feel there is something wrong or at the opposite, you feel at ease immediately, so I wasn't sure. My friend took us there and boy she was intimidated for both Dennis and I. 

When we arrived, it was a very old small building with narrow stairs and we I wouldn't have been with my friend, I think I would have been scared. We had to remove our shoes and wait. We also had to bring a gift with us and my friend told us to buy some socks for him. I thought she was kidding, but she said that they only rely on the generosity of other people and she knew he would be happy with socks. So we had some pairs of socks in a little red gift parcel.

When we entered, the room was bare excepted one old desk and kind of carpets. After we gave him his gift he asked us to sit down on the floor and he looked at us smiling without saying anything.

Immediately, I felt that "he was entering" all the cells of my body. Kindness and peace aren't things you can describe, it's something you feel. This man was pure kindness, so much it was almost uncomfortable until I finally relaxed my body and then it was perfect. It was like this concept of soul without body. He was everywhere in the room. I had difficulties looking into his eyes because it was really too much, like too concentrated and I couldn't take it. 

Then he talked. I don't remember at all what he said. I just remember we were allowed to ask 3 questions each. I don't know what Dennis asked and I only remember one of mine : I asked him if he was really never angry. I know he said No and he explained why but I don't remember what he said. He made a bracelet for each of us with colorful threads and asked to keep on our arm until it breaks. Then we left and we were outside. Dennis and I looked at each other and asked the same question: What just happened ?

I am not sure what happened. Buddhists say that you don't have to live within the limits of your body, I think that's what we saw on that day.

Take care everybody, xxx