It never ceases to amaze me how some country bumpkin, backwoods hick, and former Memphis truck driver ever made it to the forefront of the American music scene and was later honored with the icon status of a legend. That’s how I see Elvis. I always get my panties up in a bunch anytime anyone wants to drag out the dead horse to flog, the dead horse being the infamous famous lives argument. I’ve remembered nothing of being on a stage. That doesn’t interest me, for one thing. I see gawdy sequin jumpsuits as a stage costume and a parody of not only Elvis as an image but American pop music in general. I still see it that way. People want the glitz and glory of celebrity. They don’t want to see the blood and sweat it took to get there. They don’t want to see real relationships sometimes fractured by strenuous schedules that rarely merge. They don’t want to feel the pain and humiliation of either an event, early social status, or perhaps a home life that drives the celebrity to seek his or her place in the heavens. That is the most difficult thing in believing one has had a famous past life. Those who study the human spirit and accept reincarnation as part of that study often don’t give a crap wether a soul was Abe Lincoln or Abe Fitzgerald selling used Lincolns. A soul is a soul. Matter of fact. My favorite line I’ve ever read in any Elvis book was Daya Mata, then director of the Self Realization Fellowship. She scolded Elvis when he asked her for a short-cut to knowing the deeper mysteries of yoga. She said, "I don’t care who you are in the real world. You will go down the same path as everyone else. There are no short-cuts." Unfortunately for many of us who have even a passing interest in spirituality it seems we only get those who promise short-cuts. They will write books that give the answers so you don’t have to seek them. Their promises are empty, and many people become jaded, including myself.

 

When coming across any idea, belief, philosophy we want to know the value of, we must see the thing for what it is. We must suspend any previous bias as best we can else we lose the full impact of potential knowledge and wisdom. It’s like a parable Larry Geller once related to Elvis. A monk spent years in a monastery seeking enlightenment but attaining nothing. In absolute frustration he goes to his master. He complains, "Master, I’ve followed what you have taught me. I have meditated hours every day. I have walked the grounds contemplating every blade of grass, every leaf on each tree, every flower. Still I have not found enlightenment. Tell me, Master, what am I doing wrong?" The wizened old master went straight to his teapot lifting it and pouring the tea into a cup. When the cup was full the master kept pouring until it overflowed. Tea began to drip off the table and onto the floor. The student said, "Master, you just poured tea all over the floor!" "Exactly!" the master replied. "The cup is overflowing because it has not been emptied. And just like the teacup you must empty your mind before more can enter in." I think that says enough.

 

AK6