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Ask the Swami
by Swami
Beyondananda
Dear
Swami:
How do I
handle a boss who gives me no instructions for a
particular project and then complains about how it was
done?
His
standard reply to any request for assistance or any
comment on being treated unfairly is, “That’s your
problem.” Since I’m not in a position to look for
another job, he’s right. It is my problem. I even
bought one of those voodoo dolls and am thinking of
putting his name on it and sticking pins in strategic
places. Any ideas?
Mandy
Torpedos,
Berwyn, Illinois
Dear
Mandy:
Please,
please, please, no violence! Violence never works
(unless, of course, you’re a nation-state with a
powerful air force). No, your boss needs your
compassionate help. From what you say, it sounds like he
is in the advanced stages of assaholism.
The main
symptom of assaholism is assaholic behavior, accompanied
by the denial that there is any assahole problem
whatsoever. It is very important that you handle this
situation delicately and discreetly.
Perhaps
you can introduce him to a friend of yours who is a
recovering assaholic, or even anonymously leave
literature around about “Assaholics Anonymous”.
Above
all, never become self-righteous. An assholier-than-thou
attitude will defeat your purpose.
*******
Dear
Swami:
I have
asked this question of many great masters, and none
could answer it to my satisfaction. So I will ask you:
"How do
you know you know?"
Ashir
Dropov,
Brooklyn, New York
Dear
Ashir:
As far
as I know, there are Four Stages of Knowing:
1. You
don’t know.
2. You
don’t know you don’t know.
3. You
know you don’t know.
4. You
know “I don’t know” is all you need to know.
Clearly,
you have not achieved Stage Four because you still think
you need to know if you know, and your desire to be
aware of what you know and what you don’t know has led
you to a state of mental confusion.
I
understand this condition from my own experience,
because I too was a know-aware man. But then in an
instant of enlightenment, I went from know awareness to
no awareness. As soon as I knew I didn’t know, I knew.
Y’know? I’ll put it another way. All of the knowing
we fill our heads up with is to avoid a void. But
emptiness is the space of all creation. It says so right
in the Bible: “In the beginning vas the Void.”(Note:
It is not widely known that the early God of the Hebrews
spoke with a Yiddish Brooklyn accent.)
So instead of
doing a void dance to avoid an unavoidable void, we must
seek Holeness. That is why I recommend you carry your
own box of Nothing with you at all times. This is
nothing personal.
And I
recommend that you stop throwing bait at all these
spiritual masters. Believe me when I tell you this
mental master-baiting will not get you nowhere. As my
friend Brad Blanton says, “The mind is a terrible
thing — waste it”.
Read
also: "Who Is Swami Beyondananda"
and
more articles
from the Swami
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