Some months ago, I began a new morning ritual, of drinking a small cappuccino after my shower, before beginning morning practice, using freshly ground coffee and a one-cup Bialettti to make it.  I enjoy it enormously.  For quite some time, I was reading the morning news online while drinking the coffee. Then, a couple of months ago, I began reading Ramakrishna in the morning, and definitively not looking at the news before beginning my practice.  Once I began with Ramakrishna, I could not imagine how I was allowing myself to look at the news so early in the day, as for almost all of my spiritual practice years I would pay careful attention to what might come my way in the way of input before morning Sadhana.  Earlier this week after finishing the book, I started reading Great Swan all over again, and in the very beginning, when the narrator is taking us along to greet Ramakrishna for the first time, I felt like I was actually there in his presence greeting him.  I could feel his love and his accepting me into his circle.

I am also reading three other books.  I mostly read two or three books at a time.  What is unusual at this time is that they are all quite lovely, each in their own way, spiritually oriented books: “The Forty Rules of Love” (Elif Shafak) about the meeting of Rumi and Shams, the great Sufi masters; “Longing for Darkness – Tara and the Black Madonna” (China Galland); and “Shantaram” (Gregory David Roberts. I just read, today, a deeply moving chapter (The Pilgrimage to the Black Madonna) in “Longing for Darkness,” in which the author describes herself and a million other people on a profoundly physically challenging pilgrimage, two weeks of walking up to 50 kilometers (30 miles) a day.  Much pain and suffering, cold, rain, blisters, hunger, fear, and then the author shares the beauty of the camaraderie and love shared with her particular group of pilgrims, which I found deeply moving.  There is a photo of some portion of the million people in a square at the monastery, and a sign, in Polish, which translates to, “We Want God.”

“We Want God” – You see I am thinking that I am a highly developed spiritual fellow, although also knowing that I am very much just another pilgrim. So, I had been thinking how blessed I am, and how special it is that is has been given to me to be able to pray, “May I love Thee.” And then here are a million Polish pilgrims whose collective prayer boils down to “We Want God.”  I am always astounded to learn the many ways in which I find myself being arrogant and condescending.  I was reading about all this pain and suffering of their pilgrimage, and thinking, more or less, “there they go, doing the Catholic suffering thing,” but the beauty of what the pilgrims shared after reaching the end of their pilgrimage, moved right off the pages of the book and into my heart, extending my feeling uplifted today right through the afternoon.  So that I am still writing after 4 PM, when I mostly have never been able to write after lunch.

Suffering.  I have rejected suffering as a part of spiritual practice. Perhaps it has a greater role than I had thought.  I have been in profound physical pain for a substantial part of every day for the last two months.  I had been having a problem sitting in my usual meditating posture, a half lotus, for the past six months.  There would be sufficient pain after a relatively short time (I had been accustomed to sitting in this posture for long periods of time) that I would have to extend my left leg to get relief.  I assume that this is related to that major auto accident I had back in 1980 when I broke my pelvis in three places, as there are often lower back and hip issues that arise upon occasion.  While I have frequently experienced pain as a result of that injury, I had not previously suffered from the pain.  If it was there, it was there, but it was not a factor to my sense of well-being.

I explored various healing modalities trying to deal with whatever was going on that was limiting my ability to sit comfortably, finally going to see an orthopedic surgeon, who sent me to physical therapy. They did something in physical therapy while going very deep into both the psoas and piriformis muscles that led to a profound irritation of my sciatic nerve on the left side and pain that was exquisite; on a scale of 1 to 10, it was 11. And, it went on and on, until today – I had a Cortisone injection into the area yesterday, which is just beginning to take effect.

The pain in the morning was the worst; just going the half a dozen steps to the bathroom was hellish.  It was immediately afterwards that I would struggle into the kitchen to make my coffee – having become a fanatic about it  – needing to sit on a chair while doing it.  Then I would take my coffee over to the couch, open up Great Swan, and dive into Ramakrishna’s holy presence.  This pain was suffering, overriding almost everything, but it would leave my awareness when I was with Ramakrishna, which I followed with morning chanting. Was there a relationship between my physical suffering and the deep place I would go to?

Yogi Bhajan used to lead what he called White Tantric Yoga, where participants would sit in long rows of couples facing one another, generally holding postures while chanting mantra, for 30 minutes or an hour, frequently quite painful, with the overall effect being quite elevating.  There often seemed to me to be some correlation between the difficulty of the postures and the resultant elevation at the end of the workshop. And, a totally new thought for me: when we do my healing workshops we go through a valley of suffering while listening to the stories around each persons wounds, emerging at the end into a state of truly profound elevation, with the participants feeling like they are beginning life anew.

I was very grateful to be able to spend some time with Joan Halifax, a wonderful human being, at the recent SVN conference, where she was one of the featured speakers.  I brought up the subject of suffering and spiritual practice, and she said; “now you sound like a Buddhist.” How strange that I have sort of blocked out thinking about the role of suffering, when in each Self Worth workshop I lead we have to dive so deeply through each person’s suffering to come out the other side, to the place of forgiveness, self acceptance, and inner peace.

I was at an SVN conference over the weekend, with Rishi, my youngest son. “SVN” is the Social Venture Network, which I had belonged to from 1992 through 2003, during which time I was also on the board for several years.  SVN is an important organization in the worldwide scheme of things.  It was founded by Josh Mailman, who ranks, in my mind, with George Soros and Warren Buffet; i.e., people of substantial wealth who use their wealth consciously and strategically for the greater good of humanity, and Wayne Silby, the founder of Calvert Foundation, which he has been integral to building a socially conscious investment portfolio of over 14 billion, and a pioneer in the field of Social Investing; a man who’s grasp of the flow of the world’s economic systems is profound.

I was introduced to SVN through one of my closest and oldest friends, I will just give his first name here, John, another person who is of inherited wealth, who has used his inherited wealth as a trust for humanity, and about who I once wrote, is “the only person I know who suffers from an excess of likeability and competence”.  He is now not the only person I know of for whom that is true, but I met all the others through him.  John, who was/is friends with Josh and Wayne, was amongst a small group of people who were drawn together out of the isolation that they each felt from being a person of inherited wealth, and therefore, suffering the consequence of never knowing if someone was befriending you for your money or for yourself.

The decided to form a group called “Doughnuts,” where they could comfortably hang out with one another and feel safe.  As these were all people of social consciousness, their spending time together led them to develop the Threshold Foundation, which they created to have a vehicle to use their philanthropy as consciously as possible.  After a while they wanted to create an organization through which they could work together more through their collective “doing” rather than “giving”.  They also thought it would be interesting and important to include people who had become successful as socially conscious entrepreneurs, as their interest was to work together effectively.

When I joined, the  membership criteria was that one had to be an entrepreneur who had founded an organization that was socially conscious in some way, and had an annual gross income of at least $3 million, there were other related criteria for senior officers of much larger businesses, for non-profits, and for community elders like Ram Dass.  I had joined through my founding of Rainforest Products and my role, at that time, as Vice President of Marketing for Golden Temple cereals.  A nice thing about membership in SVN, is that once one has joined one can continue to be a member even if one’s circumstances had considerably changed.  There was, and is, a vetting process through which one had to prove the social consciousness of one’s enterprise – income alone is not enough.

It was a great pleasure to be back in a community in which everyone has their shoulder to the wheel in some way, each person working to serve the greater good, frequently in ways that are quite brilliant.  I have sometimes found that in the world of yogic practitioners that folks can be quite wrapped up in their inner process, in their own personal progress, with the state of the world feeling and seeming quite remote – something out there – almost as if it has nothing to do with us – like a TV program more or less.  At SVN, the world is with us, humanity’s collective pain (which there is plenty of) and the state of the global environment, is real and palpable.  But, this is not a place where people complain about how terrible things are, not at all, but, rather, where the conversation is more about what to do and how to do it better.

I led an abbreviated form of a Self Worth workshop there, perhaps more accurately described as an introduction to that work (rather than a workshop), with a brief dip into an interactive process, in which I asked participants, “How might your wounds be impacting your life, be limiting your ability to allow yourself to succeed in life, have abundance in all areas of life?” I was quite pleased with how it unfolded, as I felt it was the best short presentation I have ever given.  It was received with much approbation, with many people coming up to me throughout the conference to thank me, or share what came up for them.  I should add, that I also led a brief healing experience – as I would never open up experiencing one’s wounds without a healing of some kind.

As the conference went on, I became aware, that while just about everyone there is quite successful in the realm of doing, they are not any more successful in their personal relationships than are most other people.  I spoke about this in the closing circle on the last day, mentioning what Daddy Bray said to me about “being a radiant example of how to live on the planet,” and that as we (SVN members) wish to be examples to others, we need to live our lives in such a way that people would say, about us, that they would like to live like us, that they are inspired by us; and that in order for this to happen, more inner work is required.  I was blessed in that what I said flowed in a moving and compelling way.  Again, many people thanked me and said that they would like to see this happen.

Now, back at home, question is how to make it real and actually begin to do something.  I am attracted to bring my work here.  It would be truly interesting to see what would happen if a significant portion of this important community could more fully unleash their power – a very exciting prospect.

I was unhappy to see, when I woke up this morning, that the sciatic pain was back in my hip and down my left leg.  Not as terrible as it has been, but also not gone as it was for the last two days.  I still don’t know when or how I will be free of this.

I sat down with my tenderly brewed cappuccino, and picked up Great Swan.  I paused before opening it, and decided to bow to Ramakrishna before proceeding.  As I closed my eyes, and lowered my head, I asked myself, “How, where, in what form shall I find him, and how shall I address him?”  Remembering what Guru Ram Das told me, the first time he blessed me with a vision of himself, when I understood him to say that he has merged with one; that the one can manifest in any form, and, when I call on him, Guru Ram Das, the one can choose to manifest to me in that form. So then, in what form would I find Ramakrishna?  In some divine manifestation of Dakshineswar, surrounded by Mahendra,  Rakhal, Narendra (who became Vivekananda), and the rest of his companions.

I saw him then (I see him now), and bowed.  I know that when he was in his body, he did not have any non-Indians (as far as I know) come to see him.  Now, there must be many, and especially Les Hixon, that great man, who seem to reach liberation in five different spiritual practices, while appreciating the uniqueness of each and the commonality of all.  I am humbled to follow in his footsteps.  I addressed Ramakrishna – knowing that if you were to ask him for a blessing, he would respond by saying something like, “I am only a pillowcase, you must go to Kali-ma for your blessings.”  “I said, “I have heard that you cannot stand the touch of an impure person.  I have my imperfections and have accepted myself as imperfect. O beloved child of Kali-ma, I thank the Mother for bringing me into your presence, and humbly request that she permit me to receive the flow of her energy through your touch.” I felt his touch and began to soar, and somehow found myself checking in with Guru Ram Das, and asking him if it is alright, for me to be asking and receiving a blessing from Ramakrishna.  And felt his loving reply, “I already showed you that we are the same, different aspects of the Divine.”

After a while, I opened my eyes, and bathed in a chapter of Great Swan, which I followed with my morning chanting, feeling grateful.  When I got up, the pain was there again, but it is only pain, and not so strong as it was for a while, when it brought suffering and the diminution of my consciousness.  I have not been doing my usual morning physical exercises for a while, as it seems that no matter how gently I do them, the pain gets worse.  I have by now seen, chiropractors, acupuncturists, an orthopedic surgeon, an osteopath, massage therapists, and physical therapists. The pain was actually caused by the first round of physical therapists, as they triggered the sciatic pain (almost said “my” sciatic pain, but I do not want to own it) by pushing too hard and going to deep.  Have had an X-ray, and MRIs of my hips and my lower back.  Some lines from a Jimmy Hendrix  song comes to mind: “there must be some way out of here.”  I am open to it manifesting.

After becoming aware that I needed to open my heart, I began to do various yogic practices and meditations that were purported to “open the heart center.” Then, shortly after the 1988 Congress of World Religions in Chicago, I received a call from one of Yogi Bhajan’s secretaries, that I was to receive and host a friend of his (who had met him at the Congress of World Religions), named Ma Jaya.

I went with my wife and my daughter Snatam to an art gallery in the Castro district of San Francisco, where there was a show of Ma Jaya’s artwork. The “Castro” is one of the main gay communities on the planet. I heard this raucous shriek as we walked in (“we” were always obvious in our white clothes and turbans), and this somewhat wild looking woman walked up to us, saying something to the effect of, “Yogi Bhajan sent you to be with me. Now you have to do whatever I say while I am here.” In my mind, I went, “uh oh, this woman knows our drill.” There is a level of hospitality that is common in the Punjab, where Sikhs come from (which may be common all throughout India, but I only know the Punjab) that is far beyond what we understand to be hospitality in the USA, in which the host drops just about everything to serve and care for the guest. In my position as head of our little community in the San Francisco Bay Area, I often received and hosted various dignitaries (mostly either spiritual leaders or Indian political leaders) on behalf of Yogi Bhajan. My instructions were to treat them as I would treat him.

I learned that she was a spiritual leader, seen as a manifestation of Kali, who like myself had been a Jew from New York, who had devoted herself to serving people with AIDS. This was before any of the various AIDS cocktails had come into use, when AIDS was still pretty much a death sentence. It seemed that many of her students were gay. I was requested to attend her the next morning at what she called a “Darshan” at someone’s home in the same neighborhood – where she was staying.

The next morning, I found myself in a very crowded living room, where Ma was seated on a couch that was elaborately set up as a kind of throne, or teacher’s seat. Everyone else was seated on the floor. People were taking turns sitting before her, at her feet. She and they would look at one another intently for a little while, then they would have an inaudible dialogue, and the person would stand up with their eyes shining, and someone else would take their place.

I was standing up leaning against a doorframe with my arms folded across my chest, looking at the scene before me with a cynical and jaded eye, when she said, “Sat Santokh, come here” indicating that I should sit before her. Still feeling quite cynical, I sat before her, and she asked me, “What do you want.” Vastly, to my surprise, I find myself shaking as I sat before her, saying to myself that there seems to be much more to this woman than I had thought. I replied, “I would like to learn how to open my heart.” She simply nodded her head, and said, “OK.” I got up and continued to watch every person take his or her turn in sitting before her. This continued with time out for meals throughout the weekend. As things were finishing up on Sunday evening, she turned to me and said that she would like me to go with her to LA and spend the week with her, and I agreed to go.

In that next week, I went with her everywhere she went, seeing the face of AIDS in a way that I could not have previously imagined. We went to the dying wards at the general hospital where the patients looked like concentration camp victims with their skin wrapped around their bones; to a ward that was filled with psychotic AIDS patients; to another place where their were parents with AIDS trying to care for their children; a place where parents and children had AIDS; and many other such places of many different kinds where the people were in every stage of dealing with AIDS. We did this all week long, and somehow, none of it really penetrated to my core. I seemed to withdraw inside and look at it all with a kind of dispassionate eye.

Then on Saturday, there was to be another Darshan, this one under a tent with room for several hundred people, right in the middle of LA. Ma sent out several vans to many of the places we had visited to bring people from their wards and rooms to attend the Darshan. This was in the days when many people in the Gay community had begun to find attending funerals to be a regular part of their lives, and it was also a time when many of the AIDS victims found themselves to be alone; with their lovers having died and their parents and family having disowned them. A very lonely time – so what Ma was doing was a real service. Just prior to the weekend, Ma had requested me to ask my wife to join us for the weekend. My wife is an accomplished singer of devotional music.

As the day went on, I found myself watching a procession of the people I had been seeing all the previous week, still with the same dispassionate eye, but also with an unusual feeling working its way through me. It was like being at one of these movies, when after the movie is over and the credits are running, when you have a last and unexpected chance to one more time see the people you had become connected to during the course of the movie. A man was rolled in on a wheelchair, and Ma introduced him as having CMV, an AIDS related blindness. The man began to cry, and almost everyone else began to cry as well.

Ma asked Arlo Guthrie, a long time devotee, to sing something to relieve the situation, and then she turned to my wife and asked her to sing, and my wife sang the most powerful version of Amazing Grace that I have ever experienced. It seemed to come through her rather than from her.

When I grew up in the Bronx, I knew nothing about the existence of homosexuality. Indeed, I never even had heard of divorce before a cousin of mine divorced when I was a teenager. Mine was a very sheltered world. But everything changed for me when I moved to the Village (Greenwich Village) at 18, and, shortly thereafter, began to engage with the WRL, where more of the staff and board members were gay than not, including all of my three major mentors, Ralph Di Gia, David McReynolds, and Bayard Rustin. Afterwards, I thought I was comfortable in the gay world (and that I had no prejudices in relation to it), but I found in hanging out with Ma that I was out of my comfort zone in relating to the muscle guys, the cowboy guys, and the very tough and scary looking dikes. They did not feel like part of, as Kurt Vonnegut put it, my “karass” – the community within which I was comfortable. To me they felt like the “other.”

When Prabhu Nam Kaur (my wife) began to sing “Amazing Grace”, everyone began to sing with her, and their eyes were all shining with the beauty of the shared experience. I was singing as well, and I found myself looking around and meeting the eyes of many people. I looked at the muscle guys and the cowboy guys, and the scary dikes, and I saw the love and beauty in their eyes, and my heart opened to them and to everyone else in the room. I began to sob uncontrollably, and one of Ma’s assistants, who I knew had a profound disliking for men (based on some very negative experiences) came and put her arms around me, holding me and comforting me.

The next morning, I went to say good-bye to Ma with Prabhu Nam Kaur, before we left for home. As we stood before her, she looked at my wife and me, and, before I said anything, she smiled and said, “you’re welcome,” anticipating my thanking her for the experience, perhaps before I was fully aware of what a profound moment that had been for me.

Thank you Ma. It was a privilege to know you.

Ma Jaya’s Mahasamadhi
5.26.1940 – 4.13.2012

Join Snatam Kaur, Sopurkh Singh, Prabhu Nam Kaur and Sat Santokh Singh in this deep, and joy filled journey at the beautiful ocean side Blue Spirit Retreat Center in Costa Rica.

Last year, Prabhu Nam Kaur and I joined Snatam Kaur and Sopurkh Singh at the Sacred Chant Retreat at Blue Spirit Retreat Center in Costa Rica. We found working together to be a magical experience for ourselves and the participants, which inspired us to plan this year’s retreat, Song of the Self.

Stephan Rechstaffen, the founder of Omega, designed Blue Spirit after his thirty years experience with Omega. It is a conscious and conscientiously built fulfillment of his dream for a retreat center in a tropical environment, with a five minute walk to the ocean, incredible organic vegetarian (and vegan) food, and some of the best warm water body surfing, with miles of beautiful beach, I have ever had the pleasure to enjoy.

Let the healing vibration of Mantra and Shabad Guru take you into the song of the self, your true voice within. Let the transformational work of Self Worth give you the courage to stand up for that song. Let the miracle of Kundalini Yoga happen to you so that you may know your song and live your life from this primal rhythm.

Please come join us to bathe in the sound current, do some work on your self, practice Kundalini yoga, and kick back and relax with good company in one of the most beautiful places in the world.

Please go to the official website or email SnatamEvents[at]gmail.com to register or for more information.

Hope to see you there,
Love and blessings,
Sat Santokh & Prabhu Nam Kaur

As you can see my website has finally a new look. Thanks to Inderjot for that. studio grd did a great job.
And this section here will be my personal blog called Thoughts, which will have regular posts and expcerpts from my upcoming book.

Enjoy and please feel free to leave a comment or writing to me, using my contact form.

Sat Nam