Grace and Sublimity

Grace and Sublimity

In a profession that demands perfection, he is sublimely reliable. In an avocation that calls for composure and calmness amidst calamities, he is a Zen master of cool. He is an assassin by trade and a poker player by amusement. He kills with efficiency and plays poker with detachment to the outcome. He is a winner in both endeavors, well-to-do, kind, self-effacing, and a friend of mine. His name is Omar Sabat. You have met him before. But you don't know I have become a better man, thanks to him, if such a thing is possible. From him, I learned about grace and sublimity. Not humility. 

"Humility, Roberto, is for sissies and phonies. I have not met a truly humble man, have you? All the motherfuckers who preach about humility and modesty and tell us to listen to advice and "constructive" comments and "truths" from friends and relatives are a bunch of poseurs if you dissect and analyze not the words they use, but their tone of voice, their priggish, prickly, haughty behavior, their undue pride of their "accomplishments" which under close scrutiny are pedestrian and not striking or earth-shaking at all. Any moron with a high degree of perseverance would be all able to do all those. None of the motherfuckers is an Einstein or a Shakespeare or a Beethoven. Nobody will remember them after they die because they are, in essence, mediocre, and in fact, not as good and well-rounded as you are. You must be convinced of your own worth and excellence. You must be proud of who you are and what you are made of. That doesn't mean you should walk around with a false and fake sense of superiority because of some imagined greatness. Rather, be objective and honest with yourself as to why you think you're "better" than most humans you've met, and then move on to your areas of weakness and work on them. Respect facts and truths, no matter how unpleasant and painful they are. You're a war survivor. So am I. We are more alike than you think, although you're a bit more damaged than me. But you're doing great. You haven't killed anybody. Nor have you spent a day in jail. And you have neither robbed nor stolen nor begged to survive. You survive on the fruits of your labor and the sweats of your efforts. You're honest, sensitive, artistic, funny, extremely articulate, multilingual, well-informed, good-looking, healthy, sexy, and still popular with women, then why do the fuck you have to be falsely humble? You're a rarity. Be proud of that.

I understand after the war, we all had to navigate the waters of the aftermath all by ourselves, cut off from the psychological support that we no longer everyday had to deal with the specter of death. Previously, trying to stay alive kept our minds busy and focused. Little things didn't bother us. We thought after the war, we were liberated and free, but we were not. We now had to deal with the problems associated with being alive. Unlike me, you didn't have to cope with the anger of realizing that my life was almost wasted in order to line up the pockets of politicians and their friends. I became an assassin in order to sublimate my anger. Would you believe that several of my marks were politicians? I would have carried out  the contracts for free. 

This life after the war, this feeling of why there were men who were nicer and better people than I was, and deserving to live than I was, died while I was still alive brought to the fore of my consciousness that life is unfair and capricious and has no meaning by itself. And my very own life intrinsically has no meaning either. I have to create meaning for it. I have to make it purposeful and useful and relevant. You understand what I'm saying? That is the realization with which I still have to wrestle every fucking day. So I decided to avoid acts of self-aggrandizement, which are themselves very farcical and childish. I didn't want to do the same thing as so many hypocritical assholes did. I went for authenticity. I refused to pathologize life any more than it already was. I refused to be psychologically damaged. I didn't feel sorry for myself. I didn't want to romanticize life either. I took life as it came, accepting whatever it offered. It may be not a poetic way of living life, but by doing so I didn't let the scumbags get to me. I knew I could get rid of them easily, but there were so many of them. I would get no satisfaction from exterminating cockroaches. I liked challenges and I wanted to get paid handsomely for a job well done. I turned to Buddhism and tried to travel light. I stopped carrying memories of the war in my mind. If they came---and they still do sometimes, especially when I am fatigued or don't sleep well--- I just let them come. I was not afraid of them anymore. They lost power over me. I  realized they were just remnants of some neural activities and I was the boss and the real mensch who would not let those fleeting recollections destroy me. They came on their own and they left a few minutes or even seconds later on their own, when they saw me indifferent to them. Buddhism also taught me about grace and sublimity. I now conjure up in my mind whenever I meditate: bamboo trees gracefully sway with the winds, their leaves forever green, sunlight dancing on the leaves, and I sit in a clearing nearby, feeling alive and breathing in and out the breath of life, and feeling the sublime serenity of peace of mind, and the humming vibrations of life around me. 

I may quit my profession anytime now and go to Mexico to live out the remainder of my life. Will you come with me? A smart man quits when he's ahead, knowing that enough is enough. Napoleon Bonaparte and Hitler should have done that. I'm a student of history. I don't want to repeat the errors of others. I have more money than I can spend. I should retire from my business which is really an intimate, close dance with a drawn sword while trying not to get hurt. I'm only a man. For all I know, there may be a contract out on me at any given time, just to close out all the loopholes. 

You know, there's a progression from thought to talk to action. Talking is just thought being articulated and tested for soundness prior to committing to action. Sometimes, the intermediate talking stage is bypassed. But in my case, I'm glad you're my friend and such a good listener. You know what? I don't think anymore. I'm through with thinking and toying with quitting my profession. I've just made up my mind. I'll tell my contact that I'm out. I'll text him. I owe him at least that. You have a week to get all your shit together if you want to join me in Mexico, maybe Costa Rica. The language wouldn't be a problem for us."

September 30, 2013.
Roberto Wissai/NKBa', BSR