I wrote the first Commandment on September 16th and committed to write a Commandment a night. In about twelve days I was done with the first draft. I took a couple of days off and started to go through it for my second draft because, as in my un-blog I live a “Family Guy” existence and ofte take two-page detours into some completely unrelated nonsense, such as pedophile priests or why Al Gore is a lying loser or how masturbating with Elmer’s Glue is really not a great idea, I figured in my first book I should somewhat stay on tapic.
Reading through the first draft I was totally psyched–the book was in pretty good shape! But there were some additions and tweaks I wanted to put in, and by “tweaks” I am not referring to that lovable tense, over-coffee’d character on “South Park” that we all know and love by a similar name. I am “hoping” to finish the second draft this week, which means in the next two days. This would also mean that I started writing it on September 16th and finished on October 16th, which would mean that I write about as quickly as my first sexual experience: that I am done very soon after I start and the woman is completely unsatisfied. And with this amazing speed that seems to satisfy no one but myself, I still managed to post about 15 pieces and write a play synopsis. And they gave Obama the Nobel Prize!
I have one publisher that has committed to publishing me but, truthfully, I am not sure they are capable of taking the book where I see it going, which will include being #1 on The New York Times Bestseller List and an appearance on Oprah as the author of an Oprah’s Book Club choice book for starters. They may publish a first edition as a marketing tool to help me reach the people that I need to for its next jump. I also have a couple of good friends who I will be seeing this coming weekend who sell discount books and have many publishing contacts that they have offered to put me in touch with. If need be, I will self-publish this book and/or offer it as an ebook, as this book WILL get out there and that is just a fact.
I am also working on getting Cesar Millan, “The Dog Whisperer,” to write the Forward to the book. I contacted his people but I am not sure if they will pass on my offer to blow him if he writes it and so if any of you, through the “six degrees of separation” principle, have any connections to him that can get my book into his hands, please let me know. I am certain if he reads it he will not only write the Forward but endorse it. And maybe let me blow him.
So what the hell is this book about? Dog training? Sort of but not really. About two years ago, I took a week-long certification in Sacred Heart Yoga, which combines asana (yoga positions) with prayer. I talked to one girl who told me she was writing a book on “spirituality,” which to her meant putting one more book on the shelves on “the chakras” and “energy bodies” and “karma” that only a few goofy little New-Age freaks will be able to find in the Barnes & Noble New-Age section between the section on UFOs and the section on Channelings from Lemuria.
I told her that I was going to write a book on dog training but it would really be about spirituality. I got the blank stare that I get when I show a girl my penis for the first time and she looks at it as if to say, “Where’s the rest?” This girl just didn’t get that “spirituality” does not just involve some New-Age psycho-babble about incense and angels.
My goal is to hit the “regular” man and woman who is never going to “focus on the third eye” and instead is more concerned with “So, how does this apply to the real world?” The book is framed around “dog training” and how to better understand and relate to our dogs. It really is a book about relationships and how to remind ourselves that the goal in our relationships is not to have the “other,” be they with four legs or two, to “do what we want,” but for them do what they love and hopefully that involves not only expressing their Authentic Selves but also sharing the excitement of what’s alive in them and in you.
Below is the Introduction. I am so excited to get this book out that I couldn’t help but let the cat out of the bag so that you “dawgs,” to do a cheesy Randy Jackson from “American Idol” impression, could get a taste for the 10-course raw vegan gourmet full lion that is coming soon. Enjoy! But please don’t be a self-promoting whore like the woman who left the comment under “The Crying Tree” solely for the purpose of promoting your 10 Commandments To World Domination book or I will rip you a new one like I did her.
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INTRODUCTION
It is a long day at the office. In between fielding calls from your significant other, which leaves you feeling rather insignificant, your boss helps to clarify any doubt you may have had regarding how incompetent you are. Walking home fairly dejected, a car drives through a puddle and splashes dirty water all over your pant legs. When you finally make it home to your apartment, as you turned the key in your front door, it snaps off inside the lock. Luckily, you are able to turn it enough to open the door and drag you tired butt through.
You are greeted by your loving dog, who bounds up to you with her wagging tail flapping as fast as a hummingbird’s wings, looking at you like you’re the best thing since the invention of the squeaky toy. She doesn’t care if you messed up at work or forgot her birthday or how dirty your clothes are—all she cares about is you and she can’t show you enough how happy she is to see you. As exhaustion overcomes your body, you collapse into your chair and realize that the Theory of Gravity is not a theory at all.
Your four-legged companion sits at your feet, looking up at you like a genie ready to provide you with whatever it is for which you could desire. You pat your thighs with your hands and as if saying, “Your wish is my command,” she jumps into your lap and licks your face as if you had just finished a round of bobbing for apples in a bucket of gravy. And as you give her a squeeze, you are reminded that you are loved completely and there is nothing you can do to lessen her love for you. And without you noticing the shift, your frown has melted into a smile and gravity suddenly doesn’t feel quite as heavy.
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A dog is a man’s best friend, or so they say. But as humans, are we holding up our end of the best friendship for our dogs? What does that even require? How do you treat your best friends in human form: take them for granted, don’t always show them respect, focus on what you need and ignore what they need? Well then, that’s a perfect model for how most treat their four-legged best friends.
But deep down we want to enhance our relationships and raise the other up that we care about, instead of putting them down. It seems we have fallen so far from grace that the Garden of Union has become just a “story tail” to read and feel guilty about instead of a tool of empowerment to remind us of where we came and where we can truly reside.
We read training books and follow so many “Thou shalts” and although the authors of these Good Books claim that all this dogmatic study is supposed to somehow help our relationship to our best friends, we become great “Thou shalters” and crappy companions for our dogs. And while our dogs may behave a little more to our liking, they sure aren’t liking our behavior.
I have studied with yoga teachers who have devoted their lives to yoga, often spanning over several decades. I have studied with martial arts teachers who have survived unbelievable training, fighting in the ring and even in life and death battles. I have studied with natural medicine teachers who have cured themselves and others of diseases that the medical model claim are incurable—which they are, by the methods which treat the body in parts as opposed to in union. It is only through union (one of the translations of “yoga”), a coming together that we can express ourselves in wholeness.
But my greatest teacher to date has been my dog, Abandon. She has taught me patience, as she guided me to deal with her countless fights and the destruction of valuable property of mine. She has taught me to delve into what in yoga is called svadhyaya or “self-study,” as I really explored my personal buttons as to what it was that was so frustrating to me regarding her behaviors, the attachments I had formed to physical “stuff,” and what I really value in life.
Through all my shortcomings and failures, she has never abandoned me (pardon the pun), always ready with a wagging tail and a slobbery tongue to show me that there is nothing that I can do that will stop her fountain of love from soaking me as much as her licks.
She also has inspired me to share her teachings and blessings to others so that we can explore not only how to enhance our relationships with our dogs, and not only to help us grow in our relationships with others, but to even explore our relationships with ourselves, for until we love ourselves, how can we love another? Until we discover the multitude of plugs and cinches formed from our own past difficulties and conditionings, our hoses of love will always be a mere dribble to the blasting power of which it is capable.
In relationships, we often seek another to somehow make us “whole.” We’ve all heard a person refer to his partner as, “My better half.” The reason so many relationships go down the crapper is because of this very reason: we are not dealing with the fact that we are only a “half” and when we finally figure out that another “half” will never make us “whole,” we get kind of pissed off about it and even resentful of the other. A healthy relationship is two “wholes” combining, while still retaining their individual wholeness, to make a greater whole.
These 10 Commandments are like the ones you may be more familiar with: they are inspired by Allaha, the term for “God” in Aramaic which more accurately translates as “The Unity of All,” and they are written by Man. I humbly bow down to the feet—all four of them—of my beloved furry guru Abandon in reverence, honor, respect and love, not seeing myself as someone lesser but as a person stepping into his full power of expression of his Authentic Self just like she does without effort.
Abandon told me one day, “Everything I have shared with you, you can do and more.” If I can even share a fraction of the love that she shares with me daily to the world, and inspire you to use these 10 Commandments to “Love thy neighbor—regardless of his color or country, her sex or sensibility, his religion or retardation, her feet or paws—as your Self,” then I will feel I have stepped up as a prophet whose name is less relevant than his teachings.
In Love,
Swami X
New York City, September 26, 2009
