The further one travels the less one knows

Releases at: 07/05/2012

This Past Summer Holiday, I travelled up to the Galilee, there of all places, among the many rivers and fig trees, I decided to read the autobiography of Keith Richards. I really enjoy autobiographies. They raise and strengthen one’s perception of humanity and enable the reader to see the world through the eyes of someone else and to learn from their experience. The best ones also inspire you. The book led me to create the Journey pendant. The book is called simply “Life” and the symbol I love the most for this experience that we call life, is the Ship, which symbolizes for me, the journey of life.

Personally, I think Mr. Richards is a saint. A few years ago, I was riding in a cab and the cab driver who was religious, started to talk about a rabbi, telling me he is a great saint. As he was recounting the miracles and wonders of his rabbi, the radio, which was on, was playing a song by the Rolling Stones. I thought for a moment, and then laughed, and I asked the driver, if he knew the Band playing on the radio. He said that he did, and then I said that Keith Richards was a greater saint than the rabbi. The driver was confused for a moment and then asked me why. I explained that they sold millions of records and if we were to add up all their concerts, Internet downloads, and times they have been played in the various media, we would arrive at hundreds of billions of minutes. This means to say, they have contributed hundreds of billions of moments of joy to humanity. Which Rabbi can do that?


    


On the journey pendant is engraved, "The further one travels the less one knows" (written in Hebrew). This phrase was taken from the book of the "Tao te ching" written by the famous ancient Chinese truth seeker Lau Tsu. I really enjoy seeing the various ways people interpret the phrase, People ask me often if I believe in this phrase. For me this is the most important lesson in life. This phrase reminds me always that the knowledge and capacity to succeed in the journey of life is always in me and my close surroundings. In his autobiography, Keith Richards notes that what brought him to what he is today was his grandfather that simply pushed him to learn guitar when he was a child. In terms of a philosophical perspective, my personal understanding of the phrase is that it is an Asian version of, “As above, so below”. This means to say, that our ability to understand things emerges directly from our ability to analyze small processes in our immediate environment and to understand that those processes correspond entirely to things that happen on a larger scale. Lao Tsu would observed nature and came to precise conclusions about the world and human nature.

I like this perception because, to the same extent, the little decisions we make are exactly those that change our life entirely. Keith Richard’s story of the blind angel teaches us an important story about Karma and the way our ship navigates itself in the sea of years. The story takes place in the years 78-79. After more than a decade of heroin addiction and many failed attempts to quit, Keith gets arrested in Canada in possession of the drug. The authorities there brought him to trial and according to all predictions, he will be convicted. At the same time, he realized, he can’t go on like this, and he finally quit. On the day of the sentence, the judge charged him guilty of all related crimes. Keith was sure that he was going to jail, however, the judge sentenced him to community service; he was to put on a special concert for the blind.

Behind the judge’s sentence stood another story which shows how the decisions we make, when full of love and compassion, lead all of our lives to a better place and a better world. It turns out that a year before this happening, Keith heard a story about a blind woman that would hitchhike to all their concerts. It made him shiver to imagine that girl walking in the dark and relying on rides from strangers. He instructed the truck drivers and the roadies to take her with them to all the concerts and to take care of her accommodations and food. When that very girl, whose name was Rita, found out about the court sentence Keith was expected to receive, she decided to find the judge’s house and to talk with him directly. She met with him in his home, and explained to him how those concerts are the most important thing for her and how they give her meaning and strength. The judge who was touched by her story decided to spare him from going to jail and to simply sentence him to community service by means of a concert for the blind. Karma in action…



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