POSTCARD #125: Delhi: Taxi at Bangkok 5 am to the airport, first flight to Delhi. Travelling with Jiab who’s busy with meetings about the Nepal earthquake. I came along to Delhi because M is busy in Chiang Mai, and it’s a high stress situation, not only the earthquake but also my BP is still high and I thought the Indian doctors might provide a second opinion. The Delhi doc was very nice, so good that everyone speaks English here, and he put me on a new set of medication; let’s see what happens. So it’s back to the snarl of traffic further complicated by the construction of an overhead metro and underground train system – enough to give anyone high blood pressure. You go through a very crowded place, with lots of people you don’t know, so you tend to close in a little bit; lots of things going on and you can’t process it all. You can imagine taking a horse into a railway station and it would go crazy because horses have feeling and impression and there’s just the overwhelm. Somehow we’ve gotten used to this; the world we create. I am a theatre of processes, transitions… going along with what is assumed to be true. The construct is everywhere, staring back at us. And yet it can simply disappear in a matter of days – as in the Nepal earthquake. The media, TV and newspapers, a filter through which we see things… is this the received wisdom of hundreds of thousands of years? Self-evident; something we can see. There’s no mystery about it. Maya is a beguiling concealment – a kind of enslavement… the world as duality. Necessary to decontaminate ourselves from the media, move away from that noise. Looking for the karma that uncreates all bad karma… when this is, that is. When this is not, that is not. Jiab will be busy with Kathmandu plans for the whole of May and to allow time for other work to go on. Then she will go there for June; organize labor, seek out ‘the bare-foot technician’. Rebuild the construct, the world we live in. I’m going to be stuck in Delhi for the hot season, waiting for an extension to my Indian Visa. Then I have to apply for a new UK passport (no pages left). I shall mostly be pacing the rooms, outside temperature 40°+C (hopefully air-conditioned if the electricity holds out) Time for considering the construct, I need to have a project, maybe collating the posts into a book. A friend told me his father was in ICU for 17 days then expired last night… it can happen any time. ‘… we have no way of knowing from within the waking state, whether or not it is a dream, just as we have no way of knowing from within the dream itself, whether or not the dream is real. However, we are not in the waking state any more than we are in a dream. We are Awareness and the waking state appears in us as does the dream state.’ [Rupert Spira] ————————-
dhamma footsteps
dhamma footsteps 
I wish you all the best for your blood pressure problems. I hope it gets better soon.
Thanks Karin, I feel better already now that I can communicate with the doctors about all the subtlties of the situation…
I’m guessing you don’t really believe in ‘good’ or ‘bad’ karma. Much less ‘negative’ karma that can somehow cancel other karma out.
I don’t know what you’re doing about your hypertension but if you’re doctor shopping it’s pretty vital to make sure all of them have full access to the information about test results and therapies from the others. Of course you’d know how important it is to keep them fully informed of everything you’re taking – including alternative medicines.
There’s at least five different classes of anti-hypertensive drugs (probably more) and most people with seriously high BP will be put on at least two of them – especially if they don’t respond to the first one alone. If you’re having trouble keeping dietary salt low I’d definitely go for a diuretic.
There’s a lot of crap on the internet and in the media about lowering BP (and pretty much every other medical therapy around) so it’s best to stick to the evidence-based sources I reckon. Like this one.
One iffy therapy I’d definitely go for is dark chocolate. Yum. When I was in Asia it was pretty hard to get though. Most (but not all) cooking chocolate is dark. I’m assuming you haven’t also got a problem with high blood sugar.
At least coffee is easy to avoid in Asia (except Vietnam).
‘Looking for the karma that uncreates all bad karma…’
It’s a manner of speaking, except as a guide to avoid consciously creating all unwholesome states. I’m going to the hosp first thing in the am for all kinds of tests. It’s so good to be able to speak English with the docs here. I don’t have a problem with salt in India and there’s a cook in the house who’s in the picture about all this. Planning to keep it simple, diet and observation. Hadn’t heard about the dark chocolate one. No problem that I know of about sugars but that’s one of the tests they do tomorrow. I’ve quit coffee completely, withdrawl, headaches but now I’m on Oolong tea… see where that gets me.
Yay, Rupert!
He’s so articulate…
may you continue
on the path
of greater well-being 🙂
Thanks for these nice words…
Hope your BP problem is in control now. Great post, that photo reminded me of my visit to India back in December 🙂
Thanks manish. The chaos that seems to work, same everywhere to a greater or lesser degree…
Love the photo! And certainly hope your BP will go down. Forgot to tell you two things I give my husband for his high BP– the herb, Hawthorne, check it out on google and garlic pills. Also I am very happy to add you to my distant Friday morning Reiki list around 9 AM EDT. And you are certainly in my prayers. Now eat some healthy low salt food and try to relax. I realize this seems to be a high risk situation but anything can happen to any of us at any time. God bless, Ellen
Eastern Daylight time is nine and a half hours earlier than Delhi time, it works out just right for 6.30am, early Saturday morning here. I shall focus on that. And the diet and also interested in Hawthorne. Really when you think of it, everything is a high risk situation – so it can’t be that bad 🙂
P.S. Just talked to my 83 year old uncle yesterday who survived a heart attack, several strokes and bypass surgery and he lives by himself and is on meds but fine. He was a stock broker.
Wow! Now that’s encouraging, you come from a fine strong lineage…
No, he is an uncle-in-law. My parents died at my age or younger. Correction to my previous comment: it is Hawthorn not Hawthorne– sorry. And red wine is supposed to be good– the resveratrol in the grapes. I give my husband red Concord grape juice instead of red wine so he can stay alcohol free most of the time. Okay, I will add you to the Reiki list and will stop with all the suggestions.
Still pretty amazing, 83 and with his medical history… encouraging. Thanks for everything 🙂
The adventure of your life is such a fascinating thing to witness. I’m so glad I found your blog. Every post is full of so much wonder and provokes so much contemplation in me
Very encouraging to hear, thanks for these kind words. It’s observation of the smallest details and the larger things take care of themselves? Then minimalist editing. I also like to get rid of pronouns as far as possible, following the Buddhist principle of no self…
That is a wonderful concept to think over. I’ve been trying to find my own voice and have been playing around with some writing styles, but I’m not sure I’m quite there yet. I try to edit down paragraphs of information into a couple of sentences, and I try to keep the direction pointed toward a vague “you” as in “us all”. Keeping things direct and straightforward has been a big challenge for me, but I get so much inspiration from your writing and even how you carry yourself in your comments. You’ve been a very big source of motivation to me as far as continuing to improve myself. The most flowery language I could use still can leave some points I wanted to make wafting listlessly on their edges, but all of your posts are these beautifully self-contained, very rich windows into the moment you’re describing. And, like you said, the bigger ideas are inferred from that. It’s so, so great.
Avoid ‘self’. Keep yourself way back in the picture if possible, also avoid making it sound as if you know something and are explaining it to readers. Assume they know a lot about it already. Make them feel welcome. Glad I’ve been able to help…
Yes you definitely have, and have given me so much to consider. I appreciate it immensely
Just looking at your picture of the traffic made my blood pressure go up. I thought LA traffic was bad but this looks like total chaos! Are there temples close by you can take some pictures of?
Hi Ingebird, the photo isn’t mine it came from the local newspaper files, I’ll see if I can find the reference. It looks to me like it’s been taken from a bridge going over. The problem is the stream lower left attempting to make a right turn into oncoming traffic – India drives on the left. There are temples of all kinds, mostly well-used and worn out places – quite intimate and I’m reluctant to take photos. Some in the higher income areas are more beautiful to look at and tourists take pictures. So much to see…
Hello Tiramit, I thank you for liking my posts. Part of my spiritual learning comes from Thailand and I enjoy going there, when I can, mostly Chiang Mai. On duality and awareness I think as follows: We are awareness, but that does not mean we are not materiality, they are the same, its just a matter of language. In this schema there is no question of whether things are “real” or not, unless we mean that “reality” is what concords with our beliefs. Duality is illusion in the sense that duality itself does not exist, it is a product of poor language use. Everything is awareness in various forms, this variety causes confusion. Of course this is only my view at this time. Look forward to exploring your site, a book is a good idea! Nemir
Thanks Nemir, we have some things in common, my own spiritual learning comes from Thailand; the Theravadin Buddhist tradition in the Ajahn Chah lineage – I spend a lot of time in Chiang Mai also. Interesting to consider: ‘We are awareness, but that does not mean we are not materiality…’. It does seem to answer some questions that I’ve been pondering. Also it makes sense that the reason we can’t see that everything is awareness in various forms is that there’s a confusion – language cannot express it. So thanks too for these observations, we might follow it up later…