Thursday, 27 February 2014

Personality: Spirit

Assalāmu'alaikum wa ramatullah


I cannot remember the exact date that I did this Personality Quiz. I get the link of the website from my environmental policy lecturer, Dr. Salfarina. I guess it was around April-May 2013 at the time before my father was stricken with stroke. I keep the result in my notebook just to get to know on what kind of person I am. I use to keep many notebooks for various topics and events in life. They served as records for me and to gain confidence to go on with life. The things that I tagged at the site of this site are mostly from my notebooks. I learned from my experience and even from reactions of the people surrounding me. If I do not simply be friendly to others then, it is because I found that I am not comfortable with that particular person. Either I keep my distance or just keeping my silence. Sometimes I might appear as an anti-social. I do not have beautiful children life like others. I seldom make friend with people, my family moved a lot. I have only sisters and I am not close to my own relatives. It influences my personality.

Let's see what we have in the result....

Spirit
You are a seeker. A good listener with a gold heart. You are someone your friends know they can rely on for their support and advice in good or bad times. 
 This is especially true. It makes me feel like a black sheep to be sacrificed by human-being as their sin offerings. Sin offering is especially exist in Abrahamic traditions founded in Old Testament and we Muslims perform this during the Dhulhijja month during the pilgrimage season. I personally hated this but still people come to me for counsel or just to feel comfortable with themselves or simply to test their skills such as their preaching skills in case of those involved with the mission movements. My father, my mother, my sisters, my late maternal grandmother, the Tabligh members, acquaintance whom I do not personally know or those whom I never met before, migrant workers and so on would approach me with thousands of trouble and mess in their mind to be released on me. Later, some of them when they get what they wanted i.e the peace of mind, satisfaction or confidence and they just walked like nothing happened. I have no chance to exchange about my feelings or troubles in my mind with them... So, to some of them that I have got the chance to speak out. I asked them, I am not a deva (deity)... Why do you treat me so?! This is how I refuse to make friend no more.
Kind, generous, spontaneously helping others. 
I never realize this. I always think that I am a cold and mean person, haha... I love to give offerings to my family members or those that I know. I love to treat people. But I regret that my sisters regard me as a stingy person just because I am not so much close to them. They spent less time with me but with their friends more. So how could I express my love as a little brother to them? Love could also means prayer. Personally I do not care what people out there wanted to think about me. They are strangers. When family members do not understand us, it means that there is something wrong in our communication.
You are a sensitive soul and expressive in nature.
I studied about self through Hindu and Buddhism philosophical disciplines. It has something to do with psychological and mental phenomenon. I do not simply go to certain thing because of its popularity or because it sounds modern which is ridiculous for those immature Asian kids regardless whether they are Muslims or non-Muslims who relate this matter to modern Western world, hahaha. Even some adults tend to assume the same which is pathetic. 

I could go to Christian missionaries when I protested to my family or those around me but I do not like to be baptized and I refused Christian missions who came to me several times when I was a young teenage. I put a post here about two Christian missionaries from Korea who tried to baptize me with my non-existent roommate by insisting me to visit their church during their Sunday mass and that happened in 2012. I politely rejected them. I guess this is consistent with the first notion that I am seeker. I do care about mentality rank although I believe in Justice. Sometimes I would be in silence just because I do not want to mess with the crowd. Not because I am an ignorant. I maybe looked like a migrant worker in my appearance, wearing simple t-shirt, track-suit and speaking in ordinary language without any posh words to show about my movement. I do not like to overdo things but I love simplicity.
Sometimes you love nothing more than escaping into your own dreamworld.
I have lost the talent to day-dream, lol.
Spontaneous new experience can be really inspiring for you and you like to explore your creative side time by time.  Excited with new ideas.
True, indeed. This is consistent to my Ayurvedic type of body. I have got ideas and love to learn about new things. I guess this happens to those with vata predominant element within their body.
Right now, you are probably exhausted and running on empty. Life has the way of creeping upon you.
Still is true... I depend so much on the environment. This has to do with the prana (energy) within the air. The place where I live now is not healthy in term of its air and my family condition is not so much favorable. I could manage my life better in good environment but to get that, I have to struggle hard. It makes me tired. 
You have healthy approach to life.
Yes, I believe in healthy life as part of the mercy which must be maintained by the creatures of the God the Highest. I tried and always trying!
Regular spiritual practice gives you a sense of inner peace.
Sure, I only go to mosque when I am sad. In my teenage age, I went alone to monastery without informing my parents and involved in rituals simply to forget my troubles. I took buses and walked bare-feet just to see the guide teacher. In this sense, it actually referring to historical Siddartha Gautama. He was not in those monasteries but I went there just to pay respect to him with regard to his teachings. Just after I decided my faith that I am a Muslim. I go to mosques and cry to the God there since I have no one to talk with. Right now, I went to mosques if I have the opportunities. Because my father is bed-ridden and I cannot leave him alone. 
Time for reflection will have positive effect.
Yea, I performed tapas but this term has a very wide meaning. Most people only familiar with yoga-tapa where someone sits with lotus pose and meditating on certain states, figures, deities and condition. There are four types of yoga and the yoga in the poses consists thousands of poses. Tapa means deep meditation in molding one's soul as according to ancient Indian culture. Tapa is the heat which serves for the purpose. Since we, Muslims are the people with Arabia and our own sage as the background, so we have our own concepts, practices and terms such as alāh (act of formal contact with the God), muasabah (reflections or self reckonings), khushū' (concentration), khuḍhu' (veneration), 'uzlah (solitary), muraqabah (meditation), i'tikaf (stopping by at holy sanctuaries) and so on. I perform all of these and some of them such as muraqabah which consists of various stages at a certain degree has its parallel to Buddhist's "Palace of Mind and Actions" meditation subbed under the tapa-jñāna discipline.
Important: Tap into your inner strength. Believe yourself and be confident.
Maybe I need this in certain occassion.
Take on new challenges and stay stimulated so you remain enthusiastic and inspired by life. You love original experiences. It stimulates challenges and status quo. 
My personal experience here speaks the statement. I just do not like to follow what has been dictated especially in a particular culture or customs. The same thing goes to religion. I also do not like the comparison between religions by certain scholars because they ignored the facts that human-being live in the same Earth, human characteristics in people of other faiths, the differences due to time gap, development of certain cults or religions by the differences of regions, linguistic developments, anthropology, archeological researches and parallel matters. I could still hear about the theory that Saint Paul is the initiator of the mainstream Christianity while neglecting the points from the New Testament such as the Roman soldiers themselves worshiped Jesus while they were still pagan long before the persecution event happened in Biblical timeline. Most of all the people are just echoing the researches of figures such as Ahmad Deedat, Zakir Naik, or speculating on the information which they are capable to seek on their own. I read all of Ahmad Deedat's booklets just after I returned from my pilgrimage in Holy Mecca. Before I even decided my faith in 2003-2004, I read comparative religion through Prof. Abdul Malik Karim Amrullah works. His literature is in Indonesian language which consists of more than 5000 pages. He talks a lot about Zending (Christian missions) facilitated by the Dutch colonial master and even did his own points by digging the Bible and the literature sources. On the other hand, he was a journalist educated in traditional madrasah. However, I do not take everything as final even after looking at those stuffs. The technique which those people employed was the technique employed by the Orientalists of the early 19th century. They responded with the same manner during European Imperial powers were at their peak and religion was once of their propaganda tool. Why are we turning the same like them? 

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