Transcendent ExperiencesI knew, before I even started this series, that there would simply be no point at all in trying to give you an edited, watered-down version of my transcendent experiences. Only the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth would serve the purposes herein intended. Nevertheless, it would probably be best if most of you stopped reading here. Go on to another document. Have lunch. But don't read the rest of this. You see, all the "normal" stuff has been related to you in the previous chapters. From here on the journey becomes, as Alice said in Wonderland, "Curiouser and curiouser." The events in the rest of this document are all true. At the very least I can assure you that I have the linguistic skill to accurately reflect what I thought or felt I experienced. What it "means," and what (in an "objective" sense) actually happened, you can and will decide for yourself. But I said in the introduction that the perceptions of this author seem to require a judgment of either Divine Communion or psychosis. And please understand that I have asked myself that question nearly daily for over a quarter century. So, in all seriousness, if you found the previous material threatening or twisted in any way, please stop reading. You won't like any of what follows. IndiaThe synchronicity I experienced between my Hinduism class and my physics class in the fall of 1979 was the least disturbing and bizarre aspect of the encounter. The odd part was...and what took me a long time to come to terms with...and what a very large part of me is so reluctant to tell you...is that as we studied the Hindu Scriptures I had the constant, distinct, and undeniable impression that I had heard it all before. Have you ever seen a movie once, many years ago...perhaps you were half asleep, or drunk, or not really paying attention...When, years later, you do not even remember you have ever seen that movie before...and you rent it from the video house, or it airs on the TV...and you watch the entire movie feeling oh sooo weird? As each scene plays you remember it, but your memory is very shaky...But every now and then, maybe only a couple of times during the whole movie, you can actually tell what is going to happen before it does, because some long-forgotten memory bubbles through just enough to bring a recollection. I hope you have had that experience. Because that is exactly what it "felt" like as I read the ancient Hindu texts...the Rig Vedas, Upanishads, and Bhagavad-Gita. I had heard all this stuff before. Sometimes, I knew what was on the next page even before I turned it. Folks, as I've said, I have a degree in the Religions of the Entire World. All the majors, many of the minors. I have read many, many texts. Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Taoist, on and on...Never, ever, have I had the experience of Deja-Vu from so much as a single paragraph of text. Outside those of Hinduism. I took to the ideas of Hinduism like the proverbial fish out of water. Too much so, really. It nearly got me expelled from college. I had an East-Meets-West class, comparing and contrasting aspects of the different religions. We were given the assignment of creating a myth. Well, when I got my paper back I had been given an "F". The charge was plagiarism. Lying. I was supposed to create my own myth, and the one I related was very prominently from the Hindu tradition. The professors recognized it. It is certainly possible that I had heard that myth somewhere, somehow, at some time in my life. But I have no conscious recollection of it. All I can tell you is that at the end of the class the professor had changed my grade on that paper to an "A". He told me that "Well, I can't explain it, but that really is how you are." Curiouser and curiouser. Who am I? What is going on here? - FoodWhile at Chapman a next door neighbor took Donna (wife #1) and me to an Indian food restaurant. Folks, call me a liar. Call me psychotic. I cannot change or affect your reactions, nor can I change the fact that every aspect of Indian food reminds me of Mommy's home cooking. No, not my loving suburban mother Merna. I mean when you have been away from home for years & your Mom fixes your favorite meal and it reminds you of every home-cooked meal you ever had. Mommy India. The smells, the sights, the tastes...Heck, even the names...I've taken many people to different Indian restaurants over the years (even cooked some myself at home, though getting all the right spices from California distributors is a real challenge) and almost without discussion they let me order...Want me to...Something about it just lets them know I'm really "at home" and comfortable in the environment. Living in America we have access to cuisine from literally around the globe. I have honestly sampled (as far as I can tell) all of it. Mexican, Chinese, Egyptian, Moroccan, Thai...Oh, why bore you with the list. You get the point. But nowhere, anywhere, have I ever experienced the profoundly emotional connection to food except when it is Indian. - MusicYup. Heard it. Been there, done that. I've even done piano improvisations that folks have commented sound very Raga-esque. I even started naming them "Alap", which is the name given to the opening (unaccompanied) section in a Raga (like the equivalent of a classical symphony). I provide my own Tambura drone with my left hand... - GandhiAll of that was as maybe. Until 1982, when they released the movie Gandhi. I do not see many movies in the theatres. 2 a year is probably my overall average. But I felt compelled to see Gandhi. Anyway, it starts in South Africa, all is well, I'm just watching the movie...when...When Gandhi travels to India, gets on the train, and travels through the countryside when...I immediately start crying. Weeping. Deep, silly, uncontrollable sobs. I'm sitting in this western movie house balling my eyes out like a baby. Honestly, my friends, that one really shook me up. I've seen the movie 3 or 4 times now, and even today cannot remember hardly anything about it except that stupid trip on the train. Curiouser and curiouser. Who am I? What is going on here? - And...From the appearance of Indian ladies to the modern cinema to the dances and mudras (hand gestures) and ancient mythologies like the Mahabharata (the grand poetic epic that contains the Bhagavad-Gita, you knew that, right?) to even...oh heck, I found myself reading the Yukon Jack British publication about news from Indian one day when all of a sudden I asked myself..."Why exactly am I doing this?"...
- Explanation?You tell me. Maybe I have projected the whole thing. The fundamentalists would have me believe I have a demon that is implanting false memories. Objectively, scientifically, my answer is that I have no objective or scientific answer. The best answer I can give you is, well, hard to discuss. I simply have the experience (at least) of having been to India before. Her people, landscape, food, music and Scriptures all resonate in me with a power I find utterly unique among all my encounters with the traditions and cultures of this planet. But India, and my strange attraction / reaction to Her, would prove to be the easy part. |
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