Do converts accept Indian Hindus?

[Viraja]

Namaste,


I like cold, hard cash. So, a penny for my thoughts would do me more good than rep points.

Pranam.

Namaste Believer ji,

There will be misunderstandings when someone, when there is an option for sweet speech, resorts to harsh words...

Why I am saying that is because, millions can be given to a person who is sweet in speech towards someone in need for that at the precise moment!

Sweetness in speech is the one that demands not even a penny but can give greatest comfort to the listener! Charity that is the easiest and at its best!

Though your words also contained certain 'don't-do's to me, it was great advice rendered in the sweetest of the speeches that can be - you are truly gifted and thus deserve the amount!

Thank you.

[Believer]

Namaste,

Vannakkam: Although #1 in points is hidden, I'm 2, and you're 3. Let's face it, young man, you won't be happy until you're ahead of me. We know what lies behind these veiled comments.

Never did quite think of it all that way, but now that you mentioned it, one thing becomes quite clear - you stopped giving me rep points, as one from a heavy weight like you would put me on the top.
But I still prefer a penny for my thoughts, something that I can take to the bank.

Pranam.

[Eastern Mind]

Namaste,

Never did quite think of it all that way, but now that you mentioned it, one thing becomes quite clear - you stopped giving me rep points, as one from a heavy weight like you would put me on the top.
But I still prefer a penny for my thoughts, something that I can take to the bank.

Pranam.

Vannakkam: It's only money. I just tried to top up your points again, just for that comment, but it said that I needed to spread the points around before giving them to this user again. Too bad you can't give them to yourself. We'd both be really hogging this forum.

Aum Namasivaya

[yajvan]

hariḥ oṁ
~~~~~~
namast�

I smell the recognizable fragrance of mada� passing though the air...

iti śivaṁ

1. mada - pride

[Viraja]

Hari Om Namah Shivaya <3

There are thousands and thousands of "converts" to Dharma out all over the world...of every color...of every nationality. Some of us are not converts, but remembering something, seeking it...and locating it.

When we find it, i am sure, it is by Bhagavan's Will alone.

I never hated my color more than when i moved through my true home, a Hindu Temple for the first time. For it betrayed a truth i never wanted to accept. The fact i am here and wasn't born there...and must have done something pretty horrible to lead me away from that Divine Truth.

It was never more apparent than at the moment i found my way home...to the Temple...and to the kindred kind...which is Native Hindu.

Ask any one of the "converts" here and i bet if Beloved Mahadeva came to them and offered them an Indian body...i do not think one person would turn that down.

The biggest problem i often see between peoples from different places is Xenophobia.

Where people become so attached to their location, racial identity that they shun others based upon their location of birth and race. Feeling superior in their own skin...when it is nothing more than a decaying shell.

I was born in a place where my white skin was a minority, the religion of my family, one in hundreds...and i was exposed to racism, towards me...at a very early age. One time my sister was forced to chew anothers gum out of their mouth to prove we were not racist.

Through this i was given a gift to understand what it feels like to be on the outside...this is a location i have remained my entire life.

But, even with this education, i was not prepared for the treatment i received from some of the Native Hindus online and in person when i finally became brave enough to accept my identity.

I am not a convert...i was a lost wanderer...and i was kindly redirected...once my lessons were sufficiently behind me. By Shiva's Grace alone am i here to even type this...that i did find my way back.


So much ego is involved in hatred..so so much.

Often times, we see others through the filter of our own emotions and experiences.

Beloved Portion, each of us so dynamically different from each other...yet each of us born of the same Fabric.

Forgive whomever made you doubt the heart of these few blessed folks, who made it Home.

You may not recognize us, but we are Kindred Kind.

Thank you, NayaSurya, for a thoughtful and beautiful message.

I feel very much like you, I wonder sometimes if I am being disliked because the words I utter come from the mouth of a 'born Brahmin' (as in a curse).

The words, coming out of someone 'human' is tainted by the perceiver who views it as coming from the mouth of a 'born Hindu' or a 'Brahmin'. I am not referring to anyone in particular, but many times I am feeling that way, which is why my original question...

I thank you a million for your clarification. My humble pranam.

[Eastern Mind]

hariḥ oṁ
~~~~~~
namast�

I smell the recognizable fragrance of mada� passing though the air...

iti śivaṁ

1. mada - pride

Vannakkam Yajvan: Quite honestly, I have never been able to smell that one very well. Witnessing a humble man (in my opinion) being raked over the coals by others for being full of pride, when I was privy to deeper information has lead to much reflection on it. Who are we to smell this? Certainly not me.

Because a man can stand straight and is a good orator means he's filled with pride?

Aum Namasivaya

[Friend from the West]

Hari Om

Namaste to all

Viraja, recognize that your post has been responded to in manner that appears to be to your satisfaction, but wish to add my two cents. Much wisdom found within Believer's offerings. Within those points, much is said. Also, can never add to NayaSurya's writings as think she most often has fetters off when she writes and illuminates for us who we are.

We can find what we want to find in this www world as well as in the "real" world. Find what you want to find Viraja. This is my wish for you.

Om Shanti

FFTW

[Necromancer]

Namaste.

Hello all-

I am a 'Western convert to Hinduism' (in this birth only, mind you). I don't know how many births I have had before this and I don't know how many I have got to go (I hope not too many left).

I may have even been an Indian born Hindu in one/few of my previous births.

That would explain a lot - like why I have a fascination, awe and total love for Lord Shiva and why leaning Hindi and Sanskrit was so easy for me (although not having spoken/studied it in 15yrs has left me rusty as an old nail).

I'd like to think I am a 'Hindu' but nobody has ever told me I was. It was just something I automatically 'knew'.

People can come from anywhere in this world at all, but the fact that we all worship God in the form of Shiva/Vishnu/Krishna/Ganesha/Mother Durga or the all-pervasive Brahman. Makes us all Hindu regardless of our race or colour.

The fact that we all study Sruti, Vedas, Bhagavatam, Puranas, Bhagavad Gita, Upanishads etc and we all have some Hindu texts we personally prefer to love and quote much to the total bewilderment of other Hindus from all different sects...Makes us all Hindu, regardless of our race or colour.

The fact many of us go to temples and chant Mantras, the holy Names of the Lord, feeling His love and Light within our Heats and chanting His name in Unison, showing that we are all one before Him and there's nothing between us, nothing that divides us in loving the Lord - Makes us all Hindu, regardless of race or colour.

The fact that we all are followers of Sanatana Dharma which is the only right and prescribed way for Hindu people to live and we are honest yet modest about it...Makes us all Hindu, regardless of race or colour.

What country we are from and what colour we are is all just a huge illusion - it's just more Maya Shakti dancing about. The only thing higher than Sanatana Dharma and being a Hindu is Brahman. Adi Shankaracharya taught me that.

In regards to all the above, there's nothing to 'accept' or 'reject'. Things will just keep going on as they always have and always will...until it all stops.

Aum Namah Shivaya

[Viraja]

Thank you, Necro and FFTW ji for your replies.

[sunyata07]

Namaste Viraja,

I consider myself a converted Hindu, although I have often felt the label was never really that comfortable on me. Conversion suggests that I was persuaded to move away from my religion for whatever reason, when in fact my introduction to Hinduism was as gentle as it was organic. Sri Ganesha made Himself known to me on several occasions and when I did a little bit of reading and exploration, I just knew this was my spiritual path. Re-discovering my spiritual path from a last life is more how I feel towards it. Honestly, I am surprised you received so many "hate" messages after your advocating vegetarian lifestyle! If anything, I find that the members (both born and converted Hindus) on this board here - being serious about pursuing a sattvic life and cultivating their spirituality - are prone to encourage this as well with anyone who joins on the threads in the Vegetarian forum.

Perhaps I can invert your post a little and let you into how I saw myself a few years ago when I was still new on the converted scene. What am I saying? I'm still very much an infant trying to grasp at the meaning of some parts of this gigantic spiritual tradition. When I first experimented with the idea that I could go outside the religion I was born and explore being Hindu, I was actually very apprehensive that I would totally rejected outright. After all, I had heard and read some very staunch opinions that one must be born Hindu to be truly Hindu. I was eager to know and become like a true Hindu, that I was absolutely shocked and even confused when I encountered the fact that some Hindus were meat-eaters. I was quite na�ve, if not ignorant.

Perhaps some will be shocked by my honesty but early on I felt like an imposter trying to live out Sanatana Dharma, even though it is universal and without divide. Perhaps this is because Hinduism is so closely interwoven with Indian culture, but I knew if I had to be reborn, it would be as a Hindu. Thanks to Ganesha and reiterating to myself "I am That" this has worn away significantly. A kind of blind devotion to the purest kind of love I could feel has made it easier, but it lingers there still sometimes when I see Indian Hindus at worship or attending religious seminars, etc.

I believe there is still a lot of karma playing out in this aspect for some westerners. I do hope and pray this is something those of us who struggle with can overcome eventually. I echo Nayasurya's sentiments in that I felt there was something lacking in me perhaps in my previous life that I could be subjected to a sense of spiritual inferiority. Had I turned my back on God in a previous life that I should feel like I could only stand on the outside, looking in? On hearing her first experience with a Indian Hindu temple, I have almost set myself against finding a temple myself to avoid the pain of experiencing what I have dreaded from the start - rejection of my wanting to be Hindu.

I would love to achieve a state of equanimity in mind like the likes of Eastern Mind, who has named himself aptly on this board. I'd imagine early on in the last century it was far harder to feel part of the Hindu community unless you had a staunch desire to practice and be recognised as one.

So, Viraja, I'd imagine if anything most converts feel the opposite and are often humbled with the reminder they were not born Hindu but had to come forth from all other kinds of religious and cultural backgrounds in order to learn of this absolutely vast tradition. I am constantly surprised again and again with this faith, and so in contrast to your post that is probably why western converts will never feel truly accepted by Indian Hindus.

Om namah Shivaya