By Atty. Antonio P. Pekas
It was in 1976 when I was still in college in Laguna. I was staying then in the yoga house and there was an older member, a former leftist who came to stay with me for a while. He was having a vacation to get over a broken heart.
Sometimes we would go out to meditate under the towering Mahogany trees and other hardwood trees at Mt. Makiling. There, he told me stories about how The Buddha survived typhoons. Remember, The Buddha had resolved earlier never to stand up and end His meditation until he realized the universal truth or the universal force or God. In short, until he got enlightened. So, he did not even stand up during typhoons, even in the midst of strong rains, howling winds with tree branches and other debris flying every which way.
In such dire situations, he got protection from a big king cobra that came along. The snake would curl around The Buddha’s whole body, from head to his toes, tightly but not squeezing him to death, and the expanded neck and head of the cobra served as umbrella over The Buddha’s head.
Another story about the Buddha that should have happened earlier was when he left his wife and his baby boy son like a thief in the middle of the night. The Buddha before enlightenment was a prince married to a princess from a nearby kingdom. When He made that resolve to seek enlightenment he had to give up all worldly connections, even his family.
The decision to do that must have been agonizingly arrived at. When that night came, he still doubted himself if he could really do it. So, when he stood up to leave, looking at the face of his baby and that of his wife tore him apart, yet he did not change his mind to go and seek enlightenment.
And so he went to the forest, sat down to meditate and he promised never to stand up until he got enlightened. Of course, he became just a bag of skin and bones.
After he realized the universal truth, The Buddha or the Realized One went back to society and his son and wife he left behind years ago became his disciples.
Moral of the story, extraordinary accomplishments are not easily done, they require a firm and perhaps a more extraordinary resolve. **.
