Who the Hell is "Veda"?....

It’s been 3 years and counting since I initially attempted to start a blog…

During the first autumn of COVID-Time, I spent months mapping and designing my culinary/mixology/lifestyle/travel writer blog: HappyBeingHendo.com. I was in over my head, to say the least. After a number of failed redesigns, unrealized hyper-fixations, and $380 worth of domain-name registration fees, I finally threw in the towel and deleted the whole site all together.

It was an act of catharsis, really. An exercise in letting go. Perhaps starting a blog was a good idea, but maybe it just wasn’t the right time? It is said that knowledge is knowing what to do, but wisdom is knowing when to do it. And so, here I am, starting up the ol’ blog engine once again! This time, though, I am entering the game older and wiser. Well…older, for sure.

But what does it mean to be wise, anyway?

Wisdom is a topic so entangled in enigmatic cliche, it could deserve as much soliloquy as a thousand books or as little as a few words. For today’s purposes, let’s consider just four of these epic books of wisdom: the Vedas, India’s most important religious text, the origins of which date back nearly 5,000 years. The four “books” of the Vedas are the Rig Veda--the oldest scripture, Yayur Veda, Sama Veda, and Athara Veda. Across these scriptures lie hymns, prayers, chants, sacrifice rituals, and rituals for everyday life in the Indus Valley Civilization, also known as the Aryan people (yeah, not those other Aryans). The Vedas’ content was passed down via oral tradition and eventually written into the text we know--or translate from--today. Yoga today, however, has developed far and wide away from the mystical, ritualistic foundation of Vedic India…a musing suitable for a post all its own (*wink, wink*), but not the subject of this blog post herein.

The word “veda” comes from the Sanskrit root vid- meaning “to know”, and “veda” can be translated as “knowledge” or “wisdom”. But, so, like… which one is it? Knowledge or wisdom? From a Western point of view, and as I pointed out above, these are different things. And to me, a 13-year-old aspiring poet and novelist, as well they were different things.

Knowledge is and has been one of my most sought-after darlings in life.

As an adolescent, I loved learning and knowing things (and showing off how many things I knew). I even once beat an entire college-football defensive line in a poolside trivia competition while on family vacation in Mexico--10 grown men against one 13-year-old fat girl; talk about going mano a muchos manos! And although my mother had to accept the winner’s bottle of silver tequila on my under-aged behalf, I felt far more proud of the achievement and validation of my intelligence, albeit against a pack of drunk Texans.

Despite my Jeopardy-bound brain of useless facts, something in me still recognized the tantalizing nature of wisdom. I felt inspired by the potential for “real knowledge”; for what good is knowing things when you don’t really know things. Maybe The Vedas got it right in this way? That there is no wisdom without knowledge, and that knowledge without wisdom isn’t knowledge at all…?

Regardless, back to 13-year-old me, sitting in English class reading the Diary of Anne Frank:

“Dear Kitty…” What a strange choice of name, no?...I couldn’t wrap my head around it. Why Kitty? Who Kitty? …here, kitty, kitty! It seemed so ridiculous to me at the time. What was wrong with the classic “Dear Diary…”? At the same time, I felt inspired, perhaps even challenged. A journal had seemed like a nice idea for some time (and perhaps I even attempted to start a few personal journals--think early-2000s fuzzy cover with a lock and key--the success of which may or may not have mirrored my first few attempts at starting a blog :/ ). But, of course, I couldn’t choose just any name. I needed the perfect name. A name that I could trust, that made me feel safe in inking down my deepest, darkest thoughts and desires. A name to identify the energy/spirit/ethereal godmother to whom I would be writing. I was stumped.

As I sat behind our massive family computer screen, eyes glued to ad-free thesauruses and baby-name websites, I came across Veda: from the Sanskrit meaning “knowledge” or “wisdom”. I had no real idea what Sanskrit was, nor did I know of the enormous text and even more enormously deep history that it came from. But in that moment, my mind flashed to the classic tragically heart-warming coming-of-age film, My Girl. Maybe you know it? It is the story of a motherless girl named Veda, who must navigate the waters of puberty, young love, funeral homes, and a single-father…as the child of a single mother, and at that time in the midst of a nasty case of pubescence, I could relate. And her name: Veda. I had always liked how unique it was in the film…perhaps even metaphoric for a young girl learning to accept the cruel nature of the real world (what some might call a process for wisdom?)

Well, the name stuck: Veda.

And ever since that day, I have come to salute every single journal entry I make, from 13 to 26 years old, the same way: “Dear Veda,”. At first, it was a fun, perhaps pedantic, attempt to sow wisdom through the pen. Over time her name became a contact of respite, a shoulder to cry on, a line to the divine feminine even. Many times in those 13 years, however, writing to Veda was a mere reflex, a muscle memory, a mindless scribble rather than a mindful address to the Great Knowing, the Ultimate Wisdom. Veda has always been there for me, even when I can’t seem to motivate my endless stream of thoughts, sufferings, and revelations toward her infinite blank space.

Fast forward to today. Me. Here. Now. November of 2023. And I find myself seeking what might potentially be the most important decision in my entire yoga teaching career:

WHAT SHOULD I NAME MY NEW YOGA BLOG?

It came to me much like enlightenment came to the Buddha…..over a bowl of rice.

No, but seriously…

…it was a bowl of cereal.

(tomayto, tomahto, no?)

So welcome to my new and improved, finally and first-ever real blogsite:

DEAR VEDA:

where I will share my journey on the yogic path to wherever that may lead.

Perhaps one day enlightenment, but for now I plan to enjoy the ride, ride the wave, and wave goodbye to all that no longer serves me, from fake foods to fake friends, and especially to my dearest suffering: HappyBeingHendo.com, may you Rest in Peace.

Namaste <3