Sin Azucar

Reflection: #42

This reflection was written for the Soaring Twenties Social Club (STSC) Symposium. The STSC is a small, exclusive online speakeasy where a dauntless band of raconteurs, writers, artists, philosophers, flaneurs, musicians, idlers, and bohemians share ideas and companionship. Occasionally, STSC members create something around a set theme. This time the theme was “propaganda.” If you are a writer, I encourage you to consider joining us, I’ve included details at the bottom of this post. Lastly, you can find all my past symposium pieces by clicking here.

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Sin Azucar.

That’s what was printed on the side of my Coca-Cola can.

That’s what’s wrong with the world, I thought, maybe we all need more “Azucar” in our souls.

Presumably, those words mean "Zero Sugar." But it's the word "sin" that first caught my attention. It means, in Spanish (and I guess Latin) "without" or "zero". But, that's not what I was taught it meant when I was growing up as a good little protestant Christian boy. I understood, then, that “sin” is a whole bunch of stuff that I'm not supposed to do.

With the exception of truly horrible crimes, it kinda sounded like, at least a subset of "sin", was all the fun stuff. In the south, some churches (of which I was not one, but many of my friends were) even dancing was a sin. Drinking was a sin. Foolin' around with members of the opposite sex was dicey and probably a sin. Reading Harry Potter? Better be safe and avoid it - it’s probably a sin. Masturbating? Definitely a sin. Disobeying your parents? I don’t recall for sure, probably sin. Dungeons and Dragons? Not only a sin, but the devil invented it…and playing it guarantees you’ll become a devil worshiper and join a Satanic cult - it’s a gateway to hell, you see. Marijuana? Sin + gateway drug = hard pass, must be a mega-sin.

Propaganda from the media and authority figures made sin actually sound like the stuff I and lots of kids my age wanted to do, or at least try. With a list of rules like the one above, what kind of superhuman discipline must it take to live as Jesus recommended and "go and sin no more?"

So what is sin? Is it really a list of stuff we're not allowed to do? Does it mean, going back to its (probably Latin) roots, "without fun?" Is god the ultimate party pooper? Hardly.

My current understanding of sin, one that might lead to similar behaviors or avoidance of behaviors when regarded externally, is something far different from how I understood it growing up. Sin to me, simply means, "without God". And by “God” (I'm going to get all new-agey on you), I mean the Source, the Sovereign Artist, the Tao (that cannot be named), the creator, the force, consciousness, the “eye within the I”, awareness, the undiscovered part of science, or any other name for that deep Divine mystery that we can all feel from time to time.

No matter what we call It/Her/Him/Whatever, deep down, we're all talking about the same thing, and, if you don't believe in god, that's fine too - you can consider it/her/him/whatever as field that permeates the universe that physics just can't yet explain. Even today’s cutting-edge physicists will tell you they don't understand where consciousness truly comes from and that it seems to be fundamental in some way or another.

“Consciousness cannot be accounted for in physical terms. For consciousness is absolutely fundamental. It cannot be accounted for in terms of anything else.” - Werner Heisenberg

So, from this viewpoint, sin would simply mean to be to be without this universal consciousness, this universal awareness.

Perhaps, instead of making a huge list of things to avoid, we should simply figure out how to connect and be with (con) instead of without (sin).

What blocks us from this universal source? What separates us from it? Our own minds! Our own egos! Our own desire to control everything, which is an illusion we all desperately want to live within. That's sin.

But, once you transcend your own ego, once you accept you will die, and you “die before you die”, you can connect with this source. That’s why we are told “take up our cross” and crucify ourselves daily.

This idea puts the following words into a new light, doesn’t it? “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?”

Creativity connects you with this divinity. Nature connects you with it. Meditation or real prayer connects you with it. And, once you truly connect, and you will (at least temporarily) experience the "death" of your ego, you are again with god (sacred), not without (sin).

When you are in this connected state, you feel that we are all connected. When you know that we are all illusory incarnations of this one loving force, you no longer need a list of rules and things to avoid. For you are with God and therefore, not without and not in sin. It is a state that is possible for all of us to achieve, though only a rare few of us stay in this state 24/7 (I certainly don’t).

What then is the vaunted "original sin"? Is it the apple? Is it learning the knowledge of good and evil? Well, sort of. The original sin is when we pick up our egos and start thinking of our egos as our true "Self." Our own worldly egos (made up of rules, desires, fears, etc) take over from the real True Self (which is in harmony with this awareness.) When immersed in our egos, we still yearn for the true sugar, azucar, of life, but since we remain temporarily blocked from the source, we can only partake in fake sugars that give us nothing but addicting dopamine hits - social media, gambling, drinking, drugs, cheap sex, and, like, whatever-else-people-do-to-try-and-feel-good-but-only-get-a-cheap-rush-activities. We get artificially sweet “hits” of false life instead of the real Sugar of Divinity. And this artificial sugar creates the desire for more, and more, each desire adding more weight to our already heavily want-laden ego.

This "illusion of self" is what Buddha called "the core error." The ego knows it is false, and it is afraid of everything, and, it is especially afraid of death. When we live this way, we are living in sin, for we are living without our connection. And, when we see through this illusion, we can lose the fear, anger, guilt, apathy that the ego creates, and we simply can say "I am" - happily as we reunite with God.

And, when united with “god” (which again is this force of consciousness that does not require any particular religious belief) we don't enforce "not sinning" through force of will from the "self", following an ever-growing list of things to avoid, but we simply live in harmony with "the force," never thinking about sin, for it's impossible, by its very definition, when you are one with creation! And, coming to this realization is something worth celebrating!

So I don't know about you, but I'm going to go have a glass of wine, listen to some rock music, play some Dungeons & Dragons, and dance for a while to celebrate temporarily re-uniting with The universal consciousness that is the sweet Azucar of existence.

And I thought, when I popped that can open, that I was simply going to enjoy a Coca-Cola.

This “illusion of the self,” as the Buddha calls it, is the core error. Free from fear in its countless disguises as the inevitable consequence of that illusion — the fear that is your constant tormentor as long as you derive your sense of self only from this ephemeral and vulnerable form. And free from sin, which is the suffering you unconsciously inflict on yourself and others as long as this illusory sense of self governs what you think, say, and do. 

- Eckhart Tolle