I learned to meditate when I was 20. And just in time. A messed-up flower child, on a trajectory to the netherworld, I was often hijacked by paranoid moods:
“They know.  
They can read my mind.
I’m the only dufus on the planet who hasn’t seen the great white light.”

A few months later, at the big 1968 retreat in Tahoe, Maharishi gave us a weapon to slay negative moods:

Rishikesh, Cont. from May 15 post

Yogi Ramacharaka didn’t just propose that the body’s organs are simple conscious entities, he recommended a form of body awareness (more about that later) to communicate with them.

In chapter 19 of Hatha Yoga (click link below), he describes how the conscious mind can engage directly with an organ, especially one that’s not doing its job. His example?

Cont’ from May 10 post:
India, Spring 1970

Maharishi’s dazzling cosmic metaphor for the systems within the body— gods within gods within gods— had opened a new dimension for me: a profound and poetic glimpse into the living and intelligent parts of our bodies.

Then I found another way of understanding that truth.

One summer, on a hot day, I snuck downstairs to the basement, opened the big, white, top-loading freezer, and dug into the forbidden stash of gallon-sized ice cream tubs (ice cream was strictly for desert at meals; we were eight kids so raiding goodies was a felony).

Rishikesh, India, (Cont’)
During our course, someone asked Maharishi: what's the meaning of all those gods (lower case) in Indian philosophy? So many gods, yet the foundational teachings of Indian philosophy, especially Vedanta, affirm that all creation arises within a single, absolute oneness— Consciousness. As Dr. Tony Nader eloquently states in his book Consciousness Is All There Is, this ultimate reality is the sole essence underlying everything.

Here's how I understood his answer:

Rishikesh, India (Cont.)
Special Forces—That’s what monks are. In every culture, renunciants give up everything for enlightenment. They laser their focus on that one noble goal.

“Nature licks the feet of those whose heart beats for a single purpose,” said Guru Dev, Maharishi’s teacher.

When I first arrived in India in 1970, I rubbed my eyes—am I hallucinating? We walked out of the bustling Delhi airport to the taxi stand and: I was staring at a long, snaking row of dozens of taxis, all identical to my car back in Canada. It turned out almost two-thirds of the cars on Indian roads were clones of my car, the first automobile I ever owned: a green, 1956 Morris Oxford, which I bought in 1969 for $50.

My friends and I spent a week in Deli, visiting mystics and Vedic bookstores. Then we headed north, rested, happy, and excited, to Maharishi’s ashram in a caravan of old Ambassador taxis. In January the temperature in Delhi is perfect, but ascending to Rishikesh (1,200 ft above sea level), the air got cooler—and a lot cleaner—as we wound through farms and villages with huts and cows, buffalo, and the odd camel or even elephant: a scene that probably hadn’t changed in centuries.

From January to April 1970, Olga Campbell, David Cox, Gordie Hamilton, and I traveled to Rishikesh, India, to attend a teacher training course with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi at his ashram in Rishikesh, on the banks of the Ganges River in the foothills of the Himalayas. 

Last week we celebrated our 55th Anniversary of that wondrous TTC …

Am I a writer? Then burn from the sun
or shiver from icy cold
if my muse, intuition, flows forth about deserts
or icebergs and freezing snow.

I must be an immersive actor
so utterly lost in a role
that I’m Hamlet, Othello, Iago, (more…)

In the classic western novel, Shane,
the Hero declares:
“Ain’t no one
need be shamed
of being outgunned
by Shane.”

He was not boasting;
Shane was a master gunman. (more…)

Ancient Asian and North American indigenous communities honored an enlightened form of debating: they prioritized harmony over victory, offering a stark contrast to most competitive Western debate.

Contemporary Western debating often resembles a contest—

In this 27-minute video I tell stories about my years with working with Maharishi,  and the blissful adventures we had over the years.

In the Golden Age,
Love is consummated
With just a look.

I look at you,
You look at me…
Cupid’s arrows fire—

And pure golden light,
Electric sweetness
Flows between
Our shining eyes

I don’t know you as well as I could,
but whenever we’ve met,
it’s been clear:
You
are a lovely soul.

And reflecting on
the sparkling waters of friendship

Two brass disks
Buddhist chimes
Dangling concave down
either
end
of
a
string
Sanskrit of cosmic meaning
Embossed around
Their convex tops

We all pretend; some act it well…
We know what’s going on.
But can you claim you broke the spell—
the looking glass response?

For how we think, the words we say
are what our peers expect;

Safe inside my latest womb,
I’d left behind my thousandth tomb
and sworn to gods I’d get it right this next time.

Then I was born; they took a sword—
They struck my back, they cut the cord,
and I forgot again where I arose from.

I'm in love with AI chatbots; they're so useful. Who uses search engines anymore? Looking for something on Google search vs a chatbot is the difference between the public library and Google search.

I’m happy to announce my poetry book FINDING OUT is now available as an AudioBook. I recorded it at Sanctuary Studios on Salt Spring Island, and it is available on Audible, Kobo, Apple Books, Barnes & Noble, etc.