Tomorrow, my birthday, marks a special day for a couple reasons. One of which, is that two years ago, I became ordained as a Dudeist Priest of The Church of Latter-Day Dude. It was very fitting that as I have been stressed out a bit, later I was telling myself, I need to get in touch with my inner dude. Which inspired me to use some of my old dudeist rituals I used to perform when I was in stress recovery. So, I see it as a bit of fate that I was reminded of this recently, as in dudely fashion, I may have just forgot all about it.
I think of dudeism as a real religion, believe it or not… I guess you could say that I see it as a sub-religion. I think you can be a catholic dudeist, jewish dudeist, muslim dudeist, buddhist dudeist, whatever… It is just that we will all unite in the universal religion of taking it easy… To be unmaterialistic, try to get along, roll with the punches, and let cooler heads prevail, to name of few of the qualities… Not to mention, Abiding to the universe…
In my personal viewpoint, or sect of the religion… I look at the dude in The Big Lebowski as an over exaggeration of how I want to live my life… it is over exaggerated so that you can clearly get the message… Perhaps in retirement, people could more act like the dude, without the drinking and driving ofcourse! But, obviously there is a lot of work that needs to be done on this planet, a lot of hard work to even just survive… But as you will see on the dudeism website, there are poor dudeist and millionaire dudeist, hardworking dudeist and taking it easy dudeist… The overall message is there, and it is also an inspiration to make the most of your down time and try not to let stress get the best of you… path of least resistance…
A ritual I might do, is listening to the soundtrack on the way to work, banging on my roof as lookin’ out my back door plays to start my day. Bowling at least once a week, I bought a dudeist glass to drink out of. Also, got a dude abides sticker for my car… little things to get that inner vibe going… watching big lebowski every once in a while, as a refresher… I bought playing cards that looked like the lebowski rug… Just trying to find little ways and reminders to get in touch with my inner dudeness… Making conscious efforts to block bad thoughts and thought stop… maybe do a little meditating on the rug… All the dude wanted was his rug back…
I feel like if you watch the movie, you will better understand what I am talking about… you will probably have to watch it more than once, I found it to get funnier the second and third time I watched it… the first time, the movie didn’t really sink in, I didn’t register it all… Then the message sank in much more…
But, thought I would share as my 2-year anniversary of dudeism is coming up… I have my certificate and letter of good standing framed on the wall! In dudeness we abide… now if I could ever remember to celebrate any of the holidays, I always forget… I don’t know if that makes me a good Dudeist Priest or a Bad one haha, probably depends on who you ask!
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