anthony de mello

Few things are as rewarding as finding an unexpected jewel. It might be a film, some material thing -including a jewel- but in my case it was a book.

Anthony de Mello’s The Prayer of the Frog has been on my to read list for years, but it is a long list so I don’t really worry too much about it. A few months ago, I found another book by Anthony de Mello on the Free Bookshelf at my school: Awareness.

Well, I finally picked it up and it gave me a big slap on the face! What an awakening!

The book (published posthumously; de Mello died in ’87 the book was published in ‘90) is basically a transcript of one of his conferences. He shakes you to wake up, to start really seeing, to really listen and observe, to be aware of what we do, including charity work, to not label things, including God. The book is really priceless, with quotes such as:

We see people and things not as they are, but as we are.
Anthony de Mello

De Mello urges the reader to simplify, to understand the difference between desires and preferences. He points to our understanding of the world through our conditioning. The whole book is full of wisdom and urgency. I read the almost 200 pages in a few sittings.

One never quarrels about reality; we only quarrel about opinions, about concepts, about judgements.
Anthony de Mello

I have the privilege of working on a beautiful campus. There is a pond smack in the middle, there are a couple of gazebos for meditating, there is a beautiful chapel (arguably the most beautiful building in Boynton Beach), there is even a tree swing! There is also a beautiful library. It is not a massive library, it is rather quaint by university standards but still, it is a lovely library.

This is where it gets interesting: In order to get to my office, you have to go through or around the library, through is the much faster route.

So not only do I walk by the periodicals section where I can -at a glance- look at the new magazines coming in, then I lower my blood pressure by walking through the peaceful, quiet stacks, and right before getting to my office, there is a shelf with free books that the library no longer wants. This is my perdition.

I wrote about libraries and bookstores recently (ok, a year and a half is recently for dinosaurs like me), but that was before I had to work next to the goodie room that is the “Free books” shelves outside my office!

Over the months I have collected many varied books. My most recent find – and the detonator for this blog – was a first edition 1944 Divine Comedy with drawings by William Blake. Last year a retired history professor went into an assisted living facility, and he donated his whole library! It was chock-full of great books of which I got a good number of. And since my office is next door to these books, I always have first choice. In fact, sometimes I have even help the librarian stack the free books as he rolls them out!