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    Some Books About Gurus

    ByElizabeth

    As I have discussed with a few of you, I have been contemplating deeply and for a long time the questions of what is a guru and who is a guru.  In the context of this contemplation, I read to enhance my background and understanding, deepen my contemplation, and give myself food for thought or additional exploration.  Here are some books that I have in my library about gurus or those who have been labeled gurus (in no particular order).  Some are written with loving devotion by disciples.  Some question or comment on the interrelationship between the status of guru and the sometimes all too human foibles of the guru and his disciples.  Some are of the guru’s own experience of practice and his relationship with his own guru.

    Be Love Now, Ram Dass, HarperOne (New York, NY 2010)

    Miracle of Love — Stories About Neem Karoli Baba, Ram Dass, E.P. Dutton (New York, NY 1979)

    Autobiography of a Yogi, Paramahansa Yogananda, Self-Realization Fellowship (13th Ed., reprinted 2001)

    The Golden Guru — The Strange Journey of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, James S. Gordon, The Stephen Green Press (Lexington, Mass. 1987)

    My Guru and His Disciple, Christoper Isherwood, Penguin Books (New York, NY 1981)

    Ramakrishna and His Disciples, Christopher Isherwood, Simon and Schuster (New York, NY 1970)

    Great Swan — Meetings with Ramakrishna, Lex Hixon, Shambhala Dragon Editions (Boston, Mass. 1992)

    Bhagawan Nityananda of Ganeshpuri, Swami Muktananda Paramahamsa, SYDA Foundation (South Fallsburg, NY 1996)

    The Buddha from Brooklyn — A Tale of Spiritual Seduction, Martha Sherrill, Vintage Books (New York, NY 2001)

    Yoga and the Quest for the True Self, Stephen Cope, Bantam (New York, NY 1999)

    At the Eleventh Hour — The Biography of Swami Rama, Pandit Rajmani Tigunait, Himalayan Institute Press (Honesdale, Pa. 2001)

    Play of Consciousness, Swami Muktananda Paramahansa, SYDA Foundation (Oakland Ca. 1974)

    The Great Oom — the Improbable Birth of Yoga in America, Robert Love, Viking Press (New York, NY 2010)

    ps Jess–Yes, the widget for Library Thing is coming for the website.  I just need to add more books, so that it is a decent start at a representation of at least the yoga-related portion of my library.

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    In the “ether”

    ByElizabeth

    Yesterday, I took the plunge and joined Facebook.  I’d read one too many articles in the New York Times about it without being able to really understand what I was reading.  What an interesting phenomenon — seeing images and reading words of friends and acquaintances through space (friends around the world) and time (friends from way back).

    Tomorrow, I will be speaking on a webcast to more than a 1,000 people.

    I’ve gotten thousands of hits on this blog.

    This is a lot of shared energy without knowing most of those with whom one I am sharing. It is shifting space and time as I think about it.  In the computer world, we say or write about what we are thinking as we type or speak into the computer, and then our words and energies shift and take on their own power as they extend out instantly to anyone who chooses — intentionally or randomly — to receive them.

    I think the more we are in the ethereal world, the more we need simultaneously to make certain we are grounded.

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    In Which I Take My Own Advice

    ByElizabeth

    In the middle of another
    11-hour work day, not
    Counting the time to
    commute, the commute
    Being the round trip walk
    From home during which I
    have been practicing japa–
    Maha mrtyunjaya mantra–
    For dear spirits recently
    No longer in this body.

    In between the work,
    Between those walks,
    I stopped. I stopped
    and smelled the roses.
    Thus refreshed by visual
    Beauty and warm sun
    And intoxicating scent,
    I had the energy to begin
    Again–to continue,
    To work well.

    image

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