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Amritapuri, 21 December 2005
There was fever and a flulike feeling today. The muscles hurt, the brain made itself painfully felt with each heartbeat, and the feverish fire was felt in the cells that raised the temperature of the body. Seated in the room or on the balcony in the sun there were moments of thoughtless bliss.
A roommate offered an extract of the seeds of grapefruits, a sort of natural antibiotic, and the warning came along that the taste would be terrible. Even blended with water, as prescribed in the prescription, would the taste be so bad that it would be better to keep a water bottle open for a flush after taking the extract.
Thus the extract was taken, blended with water, though not blended with the offered idea of terrible taste.
How endlessly often do ideas and concepts travel from person to person. As a contagious flu they creep up on people to from person to person besmirch an objective perception with impure colours of prejudice.
The taste of the extract was in the coarse perception massively bitter. A strong taste that tried to seduce to discontinuation of objective perception. However in the fine perception, in the core of the massive bitterness, there was perceived a delightful touch of sweetness. So refined, and so subtle, but with that the coarseness of the massive bitterness penetrating and eclipsing.
Bitter is not terrible. It is a taste in the superficial and coarse life that seldom wants to be tasted. But still: Deeper than the surface and more refined than the coarseness there is a subtle underflow in life that brings along an overwhelming touch of sweetness, when tasted. Objective, open and subtle perception is needed to become aware of this deep taste of life. Employed ideas, opinions and prejudices about the taste of life keep man tasting at the often bitter surface of life.