INITIATION I: BIRTH (May 1974 - June 1976): The Fifth State: Cosmic Consciousness
Up to this time I still had doubts about whether TM was the path for me --- the residence course resolved those doubts. We were given an advanced program of asanas, pranayama, and extra meditations, and my experiences deepened dramatically. In one of the first meetings, I was "witnessing" --- experiencing from the vantage-point of the Higher Self; pure consciousness --- while watching a video of Maharishi describing the mechanics of enlightenment and the different states of consciousness. This exciting fusion of experience and knowledge galvanized me.
This "witnessing" was a taste of what Maharishi called Cosmic Consciousness; Transcendental Consciousness along with Waking-state --- and I now had a name for it, a technique to deepen it, and a map of what I could expect next: after one's inner or Higher Self was well established in Cosmic Consciousness, one moved into God Consciousness, where the senses became more refined and able to perceive the celestial values of creation. This refinement of perception culminated in Unity Consciousness, where the inner Self merged with the perception of the Self in all. I signed up for the very next course in July --- this time for a week. My experiences deepened still further --- I began experiencing Transcendence during Sleep and Dream states a bit, as well --- and I made preparations to go to India. I decided to stay in the foothills of the Himalayas, in Rishikesh, at the Ashram where Maharishi had taught the Beatles just a few years before. My great-grandfather Henry Vose Greenough had left me $500 --- this would be enough for air-fare and some of my expenses. I flew from Boston to New Delhi (with a one-day layover in London) in a grueling flight of about 26 air-hours in late July, 1974.
Delhi was a shock. The first sickly-sweet smell of the air as I deplaned made we want to turn around, get back in the plane, and head for home. Expecting every Indian to exude transcendental wisdom, I was assaulted by their third-world, big-city hunger for money. I took a room in a cheap hotel in Delhi, ordered lentils and orange soda (I had been warned not to drink the water), and restlessly fell asleep. The next day, I took a train north to Hardwar, in the state of Uttar Pradesh; it took all night, and I was afraid to sleep for fear I would miss my stop --- all through the night, I felt the train wheels murmuring, "Uttar Pra-DESH, Uttar Pra-DESH." A bus took me from Hardwar to Rishikesh, and then I walked the last three miles, carrying my suitcase on my head in a truly awesome heat: across the Ganges on a rickety rope bridge lined with squatting beggars chanting "Om Hari, Om Hari" to Laxman Jool --- an amazing settlement, full of temples and huge, brightly-painted figures from the Bhagavad Gita --- and then over a stream and through the woods up to Maharishi's ashram.
A few years previously, Maharishi had moved his entourage to Switzerland, and the ashram in Rishikesh was now used only for teaching Indian students to become TM teachers, and only in the Winter. It was now the height of Summer --- monsoon season was about to start --- and the ashram was nearly empty, and in a state of quiet disrepair. The head of the ashram was a Mr. Srivasdeva; he quoted a rate of one hundred dollars for a month's stay. This was steep by Indian standards; a guru named Shivananda had offered to put me up in his ashram down in Laxman Jool for a few pennies a day. However, it was still cheap by Western standards, and I wanted very much to stay at Maharishi's ashram. I agreed, and he showed me a room with a bed, a functional mosquito-net, and a semi-functional toilet and shower. I also met a huge and hairy roommate --- an 8-inch spider that was astonishingly quick in its reactive flight from my tentative touch with a pencil. One other westerner, an American named John who had been meditating for several years, was in residence, and he showed me his two room-mates --- small scorpions in the catch-well under his sink --- which I inherited after he left and I took his room. A horde of langur monkeys also hung out like juvenile delinquents on his room's roof. They were generally obnoxious, loud and angry, and for the first time I understood Rudyard Kipling's unflattering portrayals of them in his Jungle Book.
Meanwhile, John showed me around and told me stories of his spiritual experiences: he had seen a photograph of Guru Dev, Maharishi's master, actually move, and once in meditation he had felt himself become Guru Dev, even down to feeling the silk robes and the string of rudraksha beads around his neck. Satyanand, a venerable brother-disciple of Guru Dev's, was also in residence, and I enjoyed his presence, but was too shy to meet him. Another very aged Indian Brahmacharya (celibate) also lived there; he appeared timeless and peaceful: Even when his body moved, somehow "he" did not.
After several days, I was given permission to undergo "rounding" --- to begin asanas, pranayama, and increased meditations, as on the residence courses. I also began to reread the Bhagavad Gita, and, on Mr. Srivasdeva's recommendation, a huge two-volume set called the Srimad Bhagavata Mahapurana, which I bought very cheap in town. I noticed that my meditations were deepening yet further, that my breathing was becoming much less frequent and more shallow, and that my resting pulse-rate had now dropped to about 40 beats per minute, and would rise to all of 60 beats per minute after a strenuous climb back up the hill to the ashram from Laxman Jool. I could no longer wear my watch; it stopped every time I meditated. I found myself waking up spontaneously before dawn, and going to Maharishi's porch to do pranayama and meditate. The pre-dawn air had an electric quality which filled my body with energy; it made me tingle and buzz inside, and I almost felt as if I could fly. As soon as the sun came up, the energy ceased, and the air became flat again. Years later, I found that a very high saint named Tatwalla Baba had been living in the forest above the ashram, and he would have his morning "breakfast" of pranayama before dawn --- I had been "eating" his electric leftovers!
I also swam in the Ganges quite often --- though during the Monsoon season, when it rained torrentially for at least an hour every day, the Ganges became turgid, swift-flowing and gray, rushing down from the Himalayas full-laden with silt. I found it most delightful to swim just before sunset --- when I emerged from the river, the setting sun across the Ganges would flood me with rosy rays and I felt peculiarly warm and blessed. John introduced me to some very interesting holy men living in caves down by the Ganges; one --- perhaps thirty, and full-bearded, with flashing black eyes --- was absolutely beaming and full of energy; I once helped him pull a huge, water-soaked log out of the Ganges and though I'm quite strong, I was hard-put to handle my end; he lifted his as if it were a feather.
John also introduced me to a blond, Western holy man who --- I'm pretty sure --- had guided Ram Dass to his guru Neem Karoli Baba; this fellow had a much-cherished picture of Neem Karoli Baba, and was busy studying Sanskrit texts in a small hut by the Ganges when I met him. John and I bought him some coconut and sugar, and he made barfi --- a very sweet Indian dessert --- for us, and gave me some pamphlets on Ramakrishna.
However, after about six weeks (and despite my taking all the recommended shots before leaving the States), I fell very ill, with what appeared to be a malarial type of fever, and then my eye-whites and urine turned brown: hepatitis. I holed up in my room, racked with vomiting and diarrhea for several days, until the ashram officials noticed my absence and came to check on me. They gave me homeopathic and Ayurvedic remedies, and patched me up well enough for the trip home. I took a boat directly from the ashram across the Ganges to Rishikesh, and an overnight bus back to Delhi. I was still suffering from diarrhea, but did not dare leave the bus for fear of being stranded. I was in a seat too small for my knees, crammed between two villainous-looking Indians, and jolted incessantly on cratered roads; the hellish appearance of soldiers holding rifles by torchlight in the towns we passed through simply added to the nightmarish quality of that trip.
I got into Delhi in the morning, and decided to treat myself before leaving India the next day. I checked into the Lodhi Hotel, but as I climbed the stairs to my room, I stepped into a blast-furnace of a sharp, sudden, extremely-high fever. I staggered to my room, fell on the bed, and tried for the next few hours to use my room telephone to call a doctor. Every time I closed my eyes, I started lifting out of the body, and squirmy astral snakes were crawling around near the ceiling. I was not afraid of death, but I didn't want to die in India, where my parents wouldn't even hear about my death for some weeks, if ever. Looking back, I am now most grateful for the opportunity I was given to purge so many of my toxins at one time; I am certain that my trip to India accelerated my growth tremendously. I believe now that I then completed my First Initiation, or Birth, when the Higher Self descends as far as the Brow Center, and the Lower Self ascends as far as the Base Chakra, or Etheric Physical Subplane, the Realm of Earth.
I finally got though to the doctor; he came several hours later, when the fever had broken and I was feeling as if I would live. He said at that point my temperature was around 104 degrees; I don't know what it had been before. He shot me full of streptomycin (using a rather old and dull needle, but I didn't much care) for the next week, incidentally using up the last of my reserve cash (I had to sell my coat to pay the airport's departure tax). I was feeling well enough then to board the plane for Boston, though my emaciated look --- over the 40 days I had lost perhaps 40 pounds, leaving about 120 on my six-foot frame --- won me not a few distrustful stares from both customs officials and fellow plane-passengers, who probably took me for a drug-dealer. I will always remember with gratitude the British Airways flight attendant who gave me some rye sandwiches full of swiss cheese, and a British fifty-cent piece, so I could eat during my overnight lay-over in Heathrow.
Arriving in Boston under clear September skies, I was overjoyed to be home. The U.S. had its problems --- Nixon resigned while I was in India --- but it truly was a paradise! I went to the bank, withdrew the last of my funds -- about $10 --- and took a Greyhound back to Bath, Maine. I walked the last two miles home with my last fifty cents in my pocket; it did not fail to strike me that despite the various miseries of the journey, there was a kind of perfect flow involved; I was taken care of every step of the way. I got home, and saw how my mother looked at a stranger on her steps --- she didn't recognize me.
I spent the next few months at home recuperating both from the diseases, and from the cures --- I had been noticing strange eye-aches, and my doctor said it was a side-effect of the streptomycin I had been given in India; U.S. doctors no longer used the stuff, and if I had continued that treatment, I might have gone blind! I ate everything (vegetarian) in sight. I had 40 pounds of body-weight to replace, and after months of an unvaried diet of lentils, rice, and curried potatoes, even peanut butter smelled exotic.
Now I was ready to return to Harvard; I cut short my leave and returned in January of 1975. I had not been given my first choice of Upperclass houses --- Lowell --- nor my second, nor my third, nor my fourth ... I got my 13th and last choice, which was North House, up in Radcliffe. They assigned me to a private room in a semi co-op Victorian at 60 Walker Street. (This was before its exquisite period facade and ornament were shamefully butchered with plastic siding, under the House-Mastery of Dr. Oleg Grabar who, ironically, was a Fine Arts professor of presumed aesthetic sensibility!) The house was beautiful, and I loved it. I was living with about five other students, and I loved them too. I took courses in the Fine Arts department. I loved it all.
I noted with interest that the the Fine Arts Library even had one of those new coin-operated photocopiers --- now, we wouldn't have to hand-copy every quotation from a reference book we wished to cite in our papers. While the machine obviously offered us enormous time-saving advantages, I somewhat feared the potential side-effect of intellectual laziness; now we could instantly copy reams of information, bypassing our brains completely. For the most part, I stuck to hand-copying --- I was also on a budget, and could ill-afford needless expenditure.
Despite my penury, life was terrific. I took a course in the Science of Creative Intelligence --- Vedic philosophy --- at the TM Center, and began to apply the knowledge to my study of art, with generally good results. Despite my dislike of the robotic quality of the TM teachers while they were on the job, I grew to love and respect most of them personally. They were on the whole an inspiring, altruistic, and deeply spiritual group of people. I became a TM checker --- one who checks the meditations of others --- and took more residence courses whenever I could.
By the summer of 1975, my mother had rented out my old room to a tenant, and so I felt less and less tied to Bath, Maine. I spent most of my vactions working in Cambridge at Harvard's Fine Arts Library, and when I did come home, I lived in temporary quarters upstairs in the near barn. Here, I would often hear strange phenomena: Once, in the middle of a quiet rural night,a loud conversation seemed to erupt from just outside the barn, about fifteen feet off the ground; it started and stopped as suddenly as if a radio dial had been turned. I would also hear footsteps on the floorboards of the antique shop downstairs; once I grabbed a flashlight and descended to investigate. I traced the sounds into the far-barn --- they were loud hoof-clompings from the horses in the stables. All very well, but we hadn't boarded any horses in years.
Over the next several years, my experiences continued to deepen, both in meditation and out. My "witnessing" became more and more grounded, so that I would have days and nights of uninterrupted consciousness of the Higher Self underlying waking, dreaming, and even deep sleep. I noticed that other gifts were coming --- that my doodling in the margins of my notebooks in class were often precognitive sketches of things I was actually taught a few hours or days later. I could now go into the library to do research, and the right book would "jump out" in my awareness, and the book would open automatically to the exact page I needed. I now could simply sit down at my old Sears manual typewriter and write the polished version of my papers with no preliminary drafts; a handy skill, since if had I wanted to insert an afterthought near the beginning of the paper, I would have had to retype all the subsequent pages. My recall was also improving to the point of being photographic, a trait I had had as a child and then lost.
My social life also improved; by January of 1976 I even had a sex-life. My Taurus lover was brilliant, beautiful, humorous, and sensual. She was an accomplished linguist, and loved food and dancing. I found, not surprisingly, that with the right woman, sex was terrific, and was yet another way to experience Divinity. Floating back to Cambridge from her Allston apartment early in the mornings, I would feel as if the brick sidewalks were made of foam-rubber.
However, she was eight years older than I, and though we remained close friends for many years, neither of us considered this to be the love of our lives. Just before spring break I decided to fly solo again for a while, to regain a sense of self. I couldn't imagine bringing my friend home to meet my family; I wasn't ready to be seen as part of a couple.
I returned to my childhood home in Bath, Maine, for the last time that spring; by now all my brothers were in college, and my mother and sister really didn't need a large 1840's Cape with five bedrooms, two barns full of antiques for sale, and assorted outbuildings on five acres.
While standing in the upstairs bathroom and gazing out of the skylight over the barns, pasture, and Kennebeck River, my eye was drawn irresistibly up to the sun. I closed my eyes and felt the sun loving me as a conscious entity, filling me with warmth and love as I breathed its energy into me. I then turned around as I opened my eyes, and the mirror showed me completely enveloped in a large aura of brilliantly clear turquoise, which streamed more than a foot out all around my body. I squinted, goggled, shifted my eyes back and forth. The image remained steady; this was not some kind of retinal after-image. I hadn't seen an aura this clearly in years, and I had never seen such radiant energy around me! Somehow the sun had "fed" me. Perhaps, too, it was a final embrace from the house I had loved so much.
