Om, Namah Shivaya: Happy Birthday Siddhartha!

I first got to read about Siddhartha Guatama (the Buddha) when I read Hermann Hesse's "Siddhartha" as a teenager. While Hesse spun a fantastical tale from a wooden desk top in the Teutonic hinterlands of Germany, there's still a lot of great things laid down in the pages of that small text...

...According to the Gregorian (read: Western) calendars, we should be celebrating Guatama's birthday right about now (kinda like Christmas before the department stores got full frontal and crossed the street to take over "J.C.'s" b-day to sell their wares...you know the guy, that Ahramaic-speakin' dude called Jesus). I'm no Buddhist to be sure, yet I'm certain that I know a good egg when I read about him/ what he has to say to me... All across the globe people are celebrating the coming of The Enlightened One in ways that are varied and sundry and while I don't follow any singular set of religious values I feel that good shizzle can be found in all of them, if you're down with doing the heavy lifting on your own (: research). I think "Sidd" had a whole heap of great ideas to share, guess that's why millions still dig him. Here's a couple that Hesse construed while channeling him for the book ...

Religion (like patriotism) has become one of the last refuges of scoundrels but I'd be remiss if I didn't give "The Big S.G." his props...By the way, 1994's "Little Buddha" is a sweet film to catch. Don't let the fact that it stars a pre-Matrix Keanu Reeves (as Siddhartha ) with Bridget Fonda and Chris Isaak co-starring, dissuade you from peeping it out. (in the spirit of brevity/ timeliness, here's a review that says what I would've more or less. I think the through-line and message takes the viewer on a real journey (if you're looking and listening)...years ago I'd read that "Om Namah Shivaya" meant" Greetings to the being that I am capable of becoming" which I think holds true...sometimes you should read between the lines -- or the chant's vowel structure as it were ...All of that said, I'll say this: Never renege on a chance to expand yourself beyond the standard means/ methods that you've been taught (especially in schools/universities)...sometimes you've got to think "outside the codified paradigm" to fully grasp exactly where you're heading in this sweet life and it is so sweet... just thought I'd pull your coat, yo... Laters.