When I was a young man of about 19 or 20, I was contemplating a passage from Exodus one day. This exercise led to an epiphany which radically changed my religious beliefs and gave me an instant understanding of the "Perennial Philosophy."

For many years, I kept my experience to myself, thinking few would understand my point of view -- so different were my beliefs now from that of my fellow Christians. Many years later, however, I studied Eastern Philosophy under Dr. Narayana Moorty and the understanding I gained through my epiphany allowed me to read the Hindu Upanishads with the feeling that I had always known the Upanishads in my heart.

To this day, I still feel disinclined to discuss my experience and risk drawing blank stares from people, but I'm delighted to have shared my story with the venerable Huston Smith when I spent the weekend with Dr. Smith at an Esalen workshop.

I ran into Dr. Smith at one of Esalen's hot tubs overlooking the ocean in Big Sur, California. I explained to him that I had been brought up without religion but joined a club called the "Good News Gathering" while a senior in high school. Never a regular church-goer, I lost contact with my friends soon after graduation, but I retained my interest in religion.

One day, my thoughts drifted to a passage from Exodus -- specifically the part where Moses encountered the burning bush. It was then that Moses asked God to identify himself, whereupon God replied, "I am that I am."

The peculiar syntax and structure of this statement made it as unintelligible to me as a Zen koan (e.g., "What is the sound of one hand clapping?"). Indeed, this was a puzzling koan that required contemplation to unlock its meaning.

A clue to this mystery, however, was to be found in God's next statement: "Tell them that I am has sent you." Here, God referred to himself as 'I am'... that, in fact, was God's identity.

It is important to note that we identify ourselves by disclosing a unique attribute. If someone were to ask me to identify myself, and I replied, "I am a man," that would not be a meaningful answer -- three billion other people in the world could make the same claim. If, however, I were to state my social security number, then I would be uniquely identified. No one else in the world has my identification number.

So what was God's unique attribute? God said "I am" or, in other words, "I exist." And logically, if only God exists, then no one and nothing else exists. God is the one reality... the Ultimate Reality. I said to Dr. Smith, "You and I are just figments of God's imagination... we exist only in God's mind. We're like Tom and Huck in the mind of Mark Twain. Ultimately, only the author is real."

As I completed my little "sermon" in the hot tub, we stared at one another a moment. Finally, Dr. Smith said, "You must be a very old soul... you could not have gotten that from just twenty years on earth."

I smiled. It was indeed comforting to receive a sense of validation from this eminent professor of religion from MIT. But even without Dr. Smith's confirmation, nothing about my beliefs would have changed. My epiphany was a powerful experience... like living in the dark all my life and then suddenly having the light turned on for the first time.

I should perhaps end my discourse here as the rest of my story is intensely personal in nature...

No... I think that I will share the rest of it. Perhaps it will resonate with some of you who have come to visit me in this sanctuary -- this little ashram I've built in Cyberspace.

The epiphany was indeed a powerful, powerful experience, but my spiritual path did not begin there. Instead, I squandered my precious gift for many years by treating it as a mere novelty. I was still young at the time. I was still infatuated with the things of this world and I was not prepared to give up my worldly pursuits.

As a young man, I enjoyed spending my leisure time at nightclubs and discos. People sometimes placed bets on whether or not I was a professional dancer. I was also delighted that my girlfriends and dance partners were some of the most breathtaking creatures to grace this sweet earth. And in the workplace, the ultimate highlight of my career was to serve as the senior analyst on a $26-million scientific project that eventually drew accolades from the Pentagon.

Life had been good... but my spiritual path did not begin until something happened and I felt that the world had broken my heart. At that point, I came face-to-face with my dark side... my "shadow." It had grown over the years beneath my notice. Then the world broke my heart, and the seductive power of the shadow became almost too much to resist. As a result, I became hell-bent on self-destruction.

Why not? I was single. I had no wife, no family -- nothing to lose. I could afford to forfeit my life at the drop of a hat. Finally, my attachment to the world and to secular life had loosened, and I had a life-or-death choice to make. In a sense, I chose to die.

I chose to die to secular life so that my spiritual life could begin... and it has been quite a journey. With my attachments attenuated, I'm learning to embrace everything in life and yet cling to nothing.

I wish peace to all the spiritual seekers who come to this website. We know that those of us on a spiritual path aren't any better nor any more righteous than anyone else. On the contrary, we adopted our respective paths to cope with the demons which infest our lives. Our path is the way we keep the demons in check.

So again... to all my dear guests... to all my visitors and to all who may have just chanced upon this page... I bid each and every one of you:
 

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