Happy Order Birthday, Aryaprabha

Don't really know how happy I'm supposed to be. Actually, last Sunday, as I was remembering that wonderful day at Padmaloka, I felt a bit of rush, as the remembrance of my both my private and public ordinations were joyous. It felt as if it had happened a long time ago, but it was only in 2006. What has happened to me as an Order Member since? As with most things in life, it's been a long shade of grays. Sometimes clear, almost white and others the opposite, but never in the same tone. I feel very positively about my Order and its practitioners, and feel very happy to put into practice what I've learned through them, and I feel especially happy about the few, but very significant friendships I'm building or deepening within it. It's a side effect, but I also feel more confidence in myself, in general terms and in pretty much whatever I do. I do feel it was the most important day in my life, when those verses where read, in which I was reborn into the Buddha's family. It was momentous. My birth had borne fruit. It had a meaning, a reason to be far greater that what I had envisaged before. Aryaprabha became a joy, an affirmation of a conviction, of faith, and a tremendous responsibility. In this last idea is where results have been more mixed. I feel confidence in our common practices as Order Members and truly hope and wish that whatever it is that my Brothers and Sisters are doing, they are doing it ethically and thinking on their spiritual well~being. As for the personal relationships and institution~building in my context, Mexico City, things have evolved in its particular way. At times it seems our differences of ideology and practice are greater than our common training, or, is there a common thing at all anymore? And life in this city is very difficult, so it makes meetings or briefings a thing to be planned with much care and well ahead in time, and since punctuality isn't our virtue, it becomes all the more difficult... And as for the exclusive development of my personal ideology, I've willingly prioritized making ends meet and following up my professional aspirations. And I find it even surprising to myself that I don't feel the slightest need to justify either to anyone or having to explain them to no one neither. My life has become more fixed, in a way simpler, but incredibly rich and complex internally. And even with the cornucopia of diseases I suffer, my energy seems to flow nonstop. And it is here where I have to decide things which in a WBO-institutional way may sound disappointing. As I see it and experiment it, FWBO Mexico is divided into several small projects, some seemingly opposed to one another, not necessarily in negative way, just disperse. And at times I can't really figure out if there's actually any sort of coherent project at all, and so I need to channel my energies to a structure I feel I can rely on. And I find it only in my personal projects, and that's why I'm going to follow my 'dreams' and aspirations and focus in reaching a few set goals, which may not include really anything involving the Mexican wing of the Order, and at least to me, I can accept and deal with it, and take full responsibility for what may occur... So, I'm gonna sit and do my meditation, perhaps a puja later and I'm going to take some time to remember those beautiful days in October of 2006. Happy Birthday, Aryaprabha. I'm truly happy, grateful and delighted you were born.