If you’re a regular reader of I’m Not Complaining (and even if you’re new), there are some simple ways of supporting this publication:

By the way, if you like a good adventure and you haven’t seen The Journey of Rama yet, please take a look. And subscribe to get every episode!

On with I’m Not Complaining!

I posted this story a few years ago, but many of you may not have read it.

Okay, I stole the subtitle from Swami Beyondananda.

I’ve always been a seeker. In itself, that’s not unusual. As the Firesign Theatre wisely observed, “There’s a seeker born every minute.” I grew up in a secular Jewish home and felt astonishment and wonder as a child in the synagogue. I had a few experiences I considered spiritual in my youth (some aided by psychedelics), and I have always tried to find that balance between the inexpressible awe of encountering the divine and having a belief system that made some sense.

The one thing I never wanted was a guru. I thought that having a guru would make me a follower rather than a seeker.

When I was sixteen, I read the New Testament. The same year, I read the Bhagavad Gita and went to see and hear A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, who introduced Krishna Consciousness to the West. I didn’t have to go to India- he came to Brooklyn. That encounter didn’t affect me at all, but it buys me some credibility with young Krishna devotees: when they come up to me and ask, “Have you heard of Krishna?” I answer, “Yes, and I met Srila Prabhupad in 1971.” I love the look on their faces.

In 1972, I thought I heard a sound like God in the music of Charles Mingus. I studied Jewish history in college and enjoyed the company of the rabbi who managed the Buffalo Chabad House. I learned that nobody dances like Chassidim at a Purim party.

I’ve always gotten sidetracked somehow. After marrying my beloved Lillian in 1980, I believed I had a calling to explore Christianity. Got baptized. Twice (once sprinkled, once dunked). Kept seeking.

We sought together, Lil and I. Someone suggested that meditation would supply answers and that Shaktipat initiation would be most helpful. We didn’t know what that was, but it was the late 90s, and we had the Internet. We learned about Kundalini energy and how shaktipat was an awakening of that internal spiritual force by a realized being. We started looking for such a being.

It amazed us how many “realized beings” were dogged by scandal. But there was one – Shri Anandi Ma - who seemed to be the real deal. This was August 1996; Anandi Ma was going to be in Connecticut the following week and offering the shaktipat. If you’d like to learn more about Shri Anandi Ma and Shaktipat, visit dyc.org.

It all came together somehow, and the following Saturday evening, we were sitting cross-legged on the floor at the Woodbury Yoga Center, waiting.

Anandi Ma and her husband, Dileepji, entered the room. I looked up at her, and our eyes met for an instant, and (I can’t explain this) in that instant, I knew: this was the Guru I’d been avoiding my whole life.

Of course, there’s a much longer story here, and maybe someday I’ll write about following Shri Anandi Ma for the past 29 years and counting. I had found a teacher and a path despite my own best efforts, and my questions are answered. The path has been circuitous and bumpy, and I’ve wandered off the trail many times, but I keep coming back.

I’m not proselytizing here; this is my experience. Take it for what it’s worth.

So, Jewish by birth and ethnicity, Hindu by practice: I live as a Hinjew. This means that no matter how many times I reincarnate, I’ll never please my mother.

Did you enjoy this post? Then Buy Me A Coffee!