The Naked Truth

We were well aware that certain Jainist monks are what they call “sky clad monks,” meaning that in the name of renunciation they walk around completely naked. Being aware of it, however, does not mean you’re prepared for it. All of us on this trip have relatively liberal sensibilities, but that didn’t stop us from doing an internal double take when we were ushered into a room containing one naked septuagenarian and a younger man wearing a saffron loin cloth.

We hovered at the threshold, waiting for someone to make it clear that we were supposed to sit down and accept the situation, as our liberal arts education disposes us to do, or flee the room as that Midwestern part of our souls was screaming at us to do. I very tactfully made for the back row and positioned myself so that throughout the whole of the talk Megan’s head was strategically placed between my eyes and the monk. That done, I was ready to concentrate.

From behind the buffer of Megan’s hair I learned that Jainist monks only keep a jug of water to wash themselves and a peacock feather brush to gently move any insects that might be where they are about to sit. Further, they only eat certain fruits and vegetables because some are considered to be too alive to harm. Vegan’s vegans, these people. Of course, I knew most of this already. I knew that central to the Jainist faith is the belief that every single life is sacred, be it cow, bug or human. I even knew that we would be meeting naked monks. So this isn’t really the story of what I learned about Jainism. It’s more the story about what you can learn about yourself from that one little second where you waver in the door frame. Some part of your mind flashes back through your up brining and says, “Now hold on, I always got yelled at for running around naked. Where’s the fairness in this?” However, another part of you, the part of you which has been to college for three or four years or has just been conditioned to criticize social convention jumps in and demands to know why that other part of you is being so critical. You aren’t in Minniesota anymore, and even if you were, what’s fundamentally wrong with hanging around in the buff, so long as it’s not winter?

Of course, you can’t put all of this together while standing in the door frame. At that moment it feels less like an internal dialogue and more like your brain was a car and the transmission just fell out on the highway. What I’m beginning to see is important is that we recognize these moments, the moments where something, even if we were prepared for it, strikes us stupid for just a second. We need to remember that it has happened, and not trivialize it or deny it happened because it doesn’t fit with our picture of the moderate liberal sensibilities we believe we have. It’s tempting to do so, because we like to think of ourselves as unflappable and adventurous. We like to believe that we’re ready to accept anything, while it is other people who are shocked and surprised. Never us though. This is the worst mistake you can make. You must recognize these instants, even if you don’t like to admit they occurred. There is an infinite amount of wisdom to be gained by going back and looking at these staggering moments in our lives.