A clear childhood memory. I am flying fast through space towards the Earth. There’s a sense of having something important to do there.
I grew up at the foot of One Tree Hill, a large volcanic cone in Auckland. The Maori named it Maungakiekie for the kie kie berries which grew there in abundance and it was one of the great pa, or fortified settlements, of Auckland. The Maori terracing and land sculpturing were a massive engineering feat; tons and tons of earth and rock were moved. It was modelled on the facial tatoo of the presiding chief. For myself and my childhood friends the maunga, with its still visable signs of Maori occupation, was a constant source of mystery and adventure as we ran free across its slopes.
One day in primary school we learned about atoms. After class I recall looking at a huge brick wall, amazed that it was made of billions and billions of unseen atoms. Material reality was not what it appeared to be on the surface! I remember another teacher saying, “God is everywhere”. While walking home I was contemplating this idea when I was hit by the realization that if God is everywhere, he is with me right here and now, not in some distant heaven.
I would spend my holidays with Uncle Bill on his farm, getting up at four o’clock to milk the cows and returning at seven for a hearty breakfast of porridge, fresh milk and blackstrap molasses. Uncle was considered something of an eccentric by the rest of the family. He practiced yoga and ate whole meal bread back in the 50’s and 60’s before it was trendy. His bookshelf was filled with esoteric books on ghost sightings, yoga books with photos and more profound books which I couldn’t understand. He used to demonstrate Uddayana Mudra or Nauli, pulling in his stomach to form a large cavity then rolling his stomach muscles, much to my fascination and to the mild revulsion of guests. Interestingly, this mudra later proved to be important for my health, especially during a prolonged stay in India when I became sick from parasites.
I attended a church boarding school and at the age of fourteen we had a ‘confirmation’ service to become full members of the church. There were special classes and the bishop was coming to give us his blessing. I expected that this would be a deeply significant experience in my life. The auspicious day came; the bishop stood at the alter attired in full regalia and one by one we went before him to receive his blessing. I knelt and he laid his hands on my head. But what was this? I felt nothing! – just a heavy physical pressure on my skull. I was completely disappointed. I had anticipated an energy transmission of some sort – something enlightening and inspiring. I firmly decided that institutionalized Christianity was not my path.
INITIATION
In my first year of university I was seriously searching for a spiritual path. I wanted an effective form of meditation. Meditating from a book hadn’t satisfied me and the spiritual groups I had visited seemed nice, but didn’t attract me strongly. It was becoming clear that I needed a reliable spiritual guide.
I read several books about spiritual seekers and gurus in India and decided to go there to seek my own guru. I wanted only a perfectly realized teacher, a Sadguru, into whose care I could entrust my spiritual life with full confidence. I planned to travel after completing tertiary studies, however, there is no place beyond the Guru’s reach. My life was about to be accelerated markedly.
Two days later I was with friends in my hostel room having an animated discussion about meditation. There was a knock on the door and an orange-shirted young man opened it announcing a lecture on meditation about to begin in the chapel downstairs. There was something different about him which I now know was his ‘sadhana vibe’. I immediately decided to attend, though my friends declined the invitation, despite this unusual ‘coincidence’. To this day I am grateful to Jaideva, that door-knocking devotee, for his dedication that night.
This lecture had been extensively postered throughout the university, but the initial topic had not been appealing and there was zero attendance; hence the last minute door knocking for a lecture on meditation. Six of us from the hostel went down for the lecture and saw an orange-clad, lotus-bound yogi meditating on a chair under the cross at the front of the chapel. Ringlets of blond hair curled down from beneath his turban, framing his serene, lightly-bearded face. There was something special in the atmosphere. We had cautiously seated ourselves in the very back row, leaving the monk alone at the front. He finished his meditation and with a confident wave of his hand summoned us to sit in front of him. Dada’s Italian-accented lecture on meditation, mantra, Guru and the importance of social service, struck a deep chord in me. A strong, inspiring energy was coming through with an intensity I had not felt in my visits to other spiritual groups.
After an initial visit to the Ananda Marga center I read “A Guide to Human Conduct” cover to cover several times. As it was written by the Guru, I felt that I would only take initiation if I agreed with it. As I entered the jagrti a few days later, Dada asked, “Did you decide?” “Yes,” I affirmed and he sent me off for a chilly wash before sitting with him.
Initiation – the instructions from the Guru’s representative, a sense of floating timelessness and it was over. I knew intuitively that Anandamurtiji was the Sadguru I sought. I didn’t have to search the ashrams of India – perhaps my sincere willingness to do so was enough. From that day I became vegetarian and gave up intoxicants. Mysteriously, the desire for these things had gone. While Jaideva taught me asanas at the jagrti soon thereafter, I felt that in finding Ananda Marga I had come home.
