Though my grandfather died a week before I was born, he had a great influence on me. It's so strange how the one relative I never met could inspire me more than anyone else in my family. And to be honest with you, I now understand why he never took money for the things he could do. I noticed that if I took payment for helping people, even a free dinner, I couldn't write again for weeks and, sometimes, even months. And also, if I have knowledge about something but don't share it when it is needed, I can't sleep or write until I disclose the information.
Even though I don't want to be a writer, it is the gift I have. However, I do see myself as a thinker more than a writer. I am able to solve complex problems and tap into fountains of knowledge that seem to come from the mouth of God -- or some heavenly spring at the heart of the universe. This is why I cannot take payment. Even though my words have my name attached to them, I do feel that they come from a source greater than me. I am flawed and my writing is flawed, but when I am wide awake and restless, this powerful force swallows me and puts me in a cold trance. And when it does, I start to stream words. I can feel myself getting colder and colder, but I can't stop writing.
The volumes of work I have on the internet prove this compulsiveness to write, to divulge information. I have two blogs on the internet loaded with over 1,000 posts each. I have stacks of folders and notebooks from 1993 onward - that are jammed with some things that I never fully understood until years later. I never took a single check when my book was published, and just before it came out, I announced to those following me on social networks that almost everything in it was already online for free.
I do what I do because I love God, as I love your children, as I love humanity, as I love peace, truth, and justice for all. I may not be a fan of religion, but I am a big fan of God. I choose not to subscribe to any one religion because I recognize truths in them all -- both the truths and flaws. For anybody to believe that any father would want to see his children fighting is madness. It does not make the Creator happy to see anybody massacre any of his beautiful creations. If you must know the religion I choose, I choose LOVE. If you must know the name of my God, his name is Truth, or rather "He Who is One, The One Who is All."
They say that wisdom comes from suffering. This is not true. Wisdom comes from having unconditional empathy for all mankind. Any man filled with empathy is capable of gaining valuable insights on the human condition through the suffering of others. You do not need to suffer to know suffering, but you need empathy first to identify and feel the suffering of others around you. If you do not feel love for all mankind, nor see everyone around you as a valuable human and an extension of yourself, then you will never feel real empathy. And if you do not have empathy, then you will not gain, learn and remember valuable knowledge from your experiences, or those around you, so that you one day become wise. Yet most importantly, wisdom comes from having a good memory. If you do not remember anything, or are so disconnected from basic humanism to even care to dissect lessons to be gained from every experience in your life and from those around you - using simple reason and the juggling of feelings, then wisdom will forever remain a faraway planet to you.
In closing, enlightenment is a lighter form of genius, and genius is a form of mania. Every man in history who has been called a genius is typically one who can see beyond the scope of themselves, their community, their niche, their world. Textbook intelligence is not true intelligence. It only marks a man good at memorization. True intelligence does not necessarily mean one is capable of empathy, yet empathy marks one who is very sensitive; hence greater than the textbook intellectual, but no less than the enlightened.
God bless you all.
Suzy Kassem
(9/9/2014)
