by Karen Jonson
“I’ll take it all,” he said upon seeing my collection.
It couldn’t have been easier. Surely, I thought, this was too miraculous to be a coincidence.
I believed my guru had orchestrated this miracle for me.
19
Living the Dream
Settling into Ashram Life
ASHRAM LIFE WAS MORE DIFFICULT than I expected—thanks to the close proximity to so many different personalities.
There were conflicts in every corner over many issues—from whether to serve rice or potatoes for dinner to where to plant a new garden. Also, the lack of control over most aspects of my life was unsettling. The sun-up to sundown schedule was exhausting, while the noise from the ashram’s nearly non-stop construction projects was irritating.
When I complained to a fellow devotee about the challenges of ashram life, she tried to reassure me by telling me Swamiji said it takes two years to adjust to ashram living. This news was not encouraging.
In April of 1993 there were already about fifty people living in the ashram: a mix of single men and women, married couples, and about a dozen children. Within a few years, the population reached its height of about seventy adults. While the property was 200 acres, we all resided in small houses or group living situations within about one square mile.
Our proximity was a snug fit by most U.S. standards. But The Girls’ House was probably the most tightly packed 3,000 square feet on the property. It was not fun sharing a small living space with eight adult women. With all the ensuing cliques and conflicts, it was basically high school all over again.
I am not by nature a person who travels in packs. For most of my life, I had two or three carefully chosen friends at a time. In the ashram I was suddenly living with seven other women, whom I had not chosen as friends, let alone housemates. I did, however, make friends with two of other female devotees who lived on the property. We would regularly take little breaks from ashram life for some shopping, a movie, or lunch somewhere.
I learned to circumvent many of the struggles of ashram life by focusing on my career. In fact, my work became my refuge. It’s where I felt normal, competent, and self-sufficient. I had been a freelance writer in magazines, marketing, and public relations for eleven years prior to moving to the ashram. I planned to resume my career in Austin. But during my first year, I worked mostly for two businesses on the property—by chance, not by design.
One was a devotee-owned and operated infomercial media-buying firm. The other was a mom-and-pop shop that sold child safety products, such as ID cards. I soon realized I did not want to live with and work with the same people everyday. So I ventured off on my own and found some freelance clients in Austin in the healthcare and high-tech industries.
During all of the years I worked for Austin companies, I never once revealed the unusual life I was living to anybody. I decided it would be easier to keep my work life and religious affiliation separate. It was a challenge to fit my work around the ashram’s daily activities, and to find enough time for exercise, relaxation, and sleep. Soon after I moved there, I began to wonder if I’d made the right decision. Then I had two dreams.
In the first one, I dreamt that in a past life I had been on a spiritual path, but I left it because I fell in love with an extremely handsome man. One night during a gathering outdoors with a group of people, he grabbed my hand and pulled me away from the group. We looked deeply into each other’s eyes. I was mad with desire for him. We started running away. He guided me along a winding trail up a hill through a thickly wooded area. I was wearing a long flowing dress and my long, blonde hair was swaying in the wind. He had black wavy hair that fell to his broad shoulders.
We entered a small clearing under a canopy of trees and stopped. He pulled me into an embrace with his muscled arms, and I began to melt into his broad chest. Just before our lips touched in a kiss, a giant hand as tall as our bodies came out of nowhere. Like a snowplow, it pushed us. Suddenly, my would-be lover and I were separated and I was falling into a black abyss, alone.
When I woke up from my lost-lover dream. The emotional loss I felt was as if it had actually happened. But I knew it was the hand of God. I believed the dream was a warning that I had wasted too many past lives chasing worldly love. By dramatically ending my romance, God was telling me it was time to give up the pursuit of worldly love. It was time for me to devote my life to God via my guru.
In the second dream, I was kneeling on the floor next to Swamiji, gazing up at him with great love and devotion. Suddenly, the rug underneath us lifted off the ground and we were flying off into the sky. Sailing swiftly through the air, it was clear we were headed straight for the divine world. Ecstatic that I was one of the chosen few leaving this earthly world with Swamiji, I felt completely happy, grateful, and already divine. When I remembered this dream later, I was sure it was only a matter of time before Swamiji literally took me with him to the divine world from which, I believed, he had directly descended.
Life was far from perfect in the ashram—but I believed my endurance would pay off in the end.
20
Inside the Gates
Steering Clear of “The World”
INSIDE THE GATES OF Barsana Dham’s 200 acres, we lived in a self-contained world created by our guru.
We had roofs over our heads, three meals a day in the community dining room, a daily devotional program, and the occasional holiday or special program for entertainment. We also had an “us versus the world” attitude. In devotee-speak, “the world” was physically any place outside of Barsana Dham, its centers around the world, or the guru’s ashrams in India. Among devotees, “the world” was a place to be feared and shunned. Swamiji told us repeatedly: “Don’t waste your life pursuing the material world.”
If we were not with the program—in other words, living our lives according to the guru’s guidelines—we were often accused of “being in the world.” It was about the worst insult a devotee could receive. Whenever a follower left the organization, those of us still in lockstep with the guru’s worldview would shake our heads, look at each other knowingly, and comments that he or she is “back in the world.” You could feel a there-but-for-the-grace-of-the-guru-go-I shudder as we acknowledged that soul’s tragic misstep outside of the guru’s protection.
Swamiji handpicked every person who lived in the ashram. In addition to The Girls’ House, there were several other living situations on the property, including other group quarters, bedrooms in the main buildings for single people, and small houses for families. Some families had built their own homes or remodeled existing structures left over from the property’s former existence as a boys’ camp.
As per our guru’s instructions, our meals were prepared for breakfast, lunch, and dinner in the community kitchen by a rotating schedule of devotees. As dictated by Swamiji, the ashram was completely vegetarian, which meant no meat of any kind nor eggs. However, we weren’t vegan: We did eat milk products. Typical meals included toast and cereal for breakfast, soup and sandwiches for lunch, and some type of bean dish, vegetables, and rice for dinner. Later on, we were instructed to add more Indian food to our diets.
Every day was bookended by satsang in the prayer hall. From 7:30 to 8:15 a.m., we’d say our prayers, chant, and sit in silent meditation, women on the left and men to the right. In the evening, from 7:30 to 9:00, we would say prayers, chant, and watch a video speech. As is common in Hindu religious gatherings, we sat on the floor of the prayer hall cross-legged, facing the altar. All satsang meetings ended with the distribution of prasad, such as nuts, raisins, fresh fruit, and sometimes sweets.
Some of the devotees in Barsana Dham worked full-time for the ashram: at that time it was two accountants and a kitchen manager. The staff devotees were not paid, but were supported with room, board, and expenses. Some of the devotees moved to the ashram to work for a devotee-owned business on the property. Others found their own jobs in town or as self-employed practitioners of some sort.
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br /> All of the work we did in the ashram was volunteer labor (seva), without payment. Doing seva is one of the essential components of achieving God realization, along with chanting, offering gifts, and remembrance. We were constantly guided by one of Swamiji’s key messages: “Seva quickly purifies your heart and mind, and brings you closer to the master and Radha Krishna.”
When not working, in satsang, our life was dedicated to serving the guru’s divine mission. We engaged in a wide range of activities to keep the ashram running, such as cooking, cleaning, gardening, and maintenance. My regular sevas were cooking, cleaning, and preparing the prasad for the evening satsang program. Those with special skills had other specialized sevas, such as editing video speeches, translating speeches, decorating, and building the new structures. There was always more work to be done than people to do it.
We even had our own forms of entertainment, including celebrations for Swamiji’s birthdays and Hindu holidays, like Holi, Krishna Janmashtami, and Diwali. Swamiji taught the Western devotees all of the essential components of each holiday, including what food to cook, which sweets to serve, how to string flower garlands and decorate the prayer hall, and which religious skits to perform during the events. Over the years, the holidays became public events that attracted hundreds and even thousands of people.
Swamiji flew back and forth from India to the U.S. several times a year. When he was in residence, which was generally about half the time, we spent time with him during his morning and afternoon meals and sometimes assisted him in special events or projects.
Early in my spiritual search, I had come across Scott Peck’s iconic book, The Road Less Traveled. His first line struck a chord with me: “Life is difficult.” I believed this wholeheartedly, because that’s exactly what I had experienced in my youth. Now I was hoping for an existence that would eradicate the difficulty of the world as I knew it. I thought I had found in it Barsana Dham under the tutelage of Swamiji.
At first, I felt safe in the ashram. Many nights on the way to satsang or heading back to The Girls’ House, I would look up at the dark Texas sky, gaze at the moon and stars, and thank God I was safely ensconced in this unique divine island of devotion.
I counted my blessings that I was no longer alone out in the big, bad world without a divine guide.
21
Hinduism Light
The Western-Friendly Dogma
IN THE EARLY DAYS, Swamiji played down the fact that we were essentially Hindus, since we were practicing Hinduism.
Actually, I didn’t even know I was a Hindu until I’d been a devotee in his organization for over a year. When I found the path, I assumed it was not affiliated with any specific religion, because no one ever mentioned the words Hinduism or Hindu in the beginning. In hindsight, I assumed this was because Swamiji would not risk scaring off Western devotees with traditional aspects of Hinduism, such as worshipping Lord Hanuman, who takes the form of a monkey, or Lord Ganesha, who takes the form of an elephant. He also left out many common Hindu rituals, such as fire ceremonies and fasting. People in the Western side of the world like things with a more “New Age” packaging. Swamiji’s particular brand of Hinduism was packaged to fit the Western world, just as McDonald's redesigns its traditional menu to match cultural preferences in India.
During my pre-Swamiji years, I had read only one small book on Hinduism and heard only one lecture given by a Hindu monk. Neither the book nor the monk mentioned the divine-love concepts of Hinduism espoused by Swamiji and his preachers. Intrinsic to Swamiji’s philosophy of “divine love consciousness” (raganuga bhakti in Hindi), was the form of God called Radha-Krishna, which is one God in two forms: male and female. However, unlike any other branch of Hinduism, Swamiji emphasized the female form as being supreme. He taught us that Radha is, in fact, the highest form of God, but that few know this secret, even among Hindus, because Radha is commonly believed to be just a “consort” or the primary love interest of Krishna.
However, Swamiji’s comments on the subject were vague. For example, he wrote: “This is the Divine secret of Radha’s personality which is extensively revealed in the writings of the Saints of Vrindavan, where they describe the indescribable superiority of Radha’s beauty, charm, and love in all leelas of Divine Vrindavan.” Divine Vrindaban is one of the highest “abodes” of god.
The hallmark of Radha-Krishna is the countless divine loving activities they engage in with each other and their “playmates,” the young cow-herding maidens called gopis. Their divine actions are called leelas, and include everything from dancing to eating to performing loving actions in worship of God. We were instructed to meditate on leelas in satsang—even to envision ourselves actually participating in leelas in the divine world. As Swamiji wrote in one of his books: “Radha Krishna descend on the Earth planet to Grace everyone. They Grace souls by revealing Their love and leelas for them, which are even beyond the understanding and reach of the creator Brahma and Maha Lakshmi.”
Swamiji said the more we meditated on Radha-Krishna, the quicker we would purify our material hearts, become divine like him, and attain our spiritual goal. One way to meditate on these leelas, as well as the forms of God, was to say God’s many names over and over. The common way to do this was in kirtan, which means chanting or singing.
But we were also supposed to imagine we were engaging in leelas with Radha-Krishna as we carried out our tasks around the ashram. Swamiji said this was “direct service to God” and would speed up our spiritual progress. We were also told to do our work in the world with our thoughts constantly on the divine, because our jobs were also a form of seva. In fact, we were instructed to remember God’s name constantly—even while sleeping. This was the “best way to purify our worldly hearts and minds,” he said.
While striving to achieve divinity, devotees sometimes experienced the ecstatic state of bhao—a transcendental hypnotic mental state where a person feels God’s presence within themselves. When a person “goes into bhao” they might feel tingly or warm, sway uncontrollably, or even pass out. It’s basically a deep dive into the subconscious mind where a person, ideally, temporarily loses touch with the conscious world and enters an ecstatic state of mind, envisioning God with him, in him, and around him.
Devotees craved this experience. If they achieved bhao once, they wanted it again and again, the way a junkie craves a fix. Some devotees claimed to have experienced many bouts of bhao. I was not one of them. Because I never went into bhao, I doubted its existence and felt the devotees’ claims of bhao were more likely self-induced states of forced euphoria. After all, the mind can imagine all kinds of things, given enough desire and suggestion. But I kept this non-devotional thought to myself.
The goal of all of this focus on God was to divinize our minds so that we could achieve union with Radha-Krishna—ideally in the form of a gopi. According to Swamiji, becoming a gopi was the most coveted of all divine states that a human could achieve. Living eternally in the divine world in this form gives souls the opportunity to participate in many “intimate divine activities” with Krishna, such as the mystical divine dance called maharas in which it appears that He is dancing with each gopi individually.
Swamiji taught us that there was a downside to not following the spiritual path he propagated: Our souls would be trapped in maya (the world) for uncountable lifetimes. He said if we missed this rare chance, we could be reborn over and over again. And not necessarily as humans, but as every conceivable form of life: plants, bugs, or animals. He once said: “Being on the path to God is like climbing a tree. If you let go, you fall to Earth. The higher you climb, the greater the damage will be if you fall, because you’ll break more bones. Once you fall, you might never get the opportunity to find such a rare spiritual path and master again.”
There were many obstacles on the path to God realization, including our own bad sanskars (past-life actions), committing new transgressions, and our attachments to anything in the world. Attachments to any “worldly” p
erson, object, or activity were to be avoided at all cost. This included our family members, possessions, and pride.
Regarding sanskars, he said, “Sometimes strong bad sanskars of our past lives influence our actions in this lifetime and effect our dedication. When such things happen he should know that his old sanskars are playing with his mind. He must then, firmly keep doing his devotions and service, and pray [sic] Radha Krishna and his Master to overcome this situation and to improve his faith and dedication.”
Transgressions came in many forms, but the worst was having a negative thought against the guru. This was an almost unforgivable offense. Swamiji cautioned: “Even God himself might not be able to free a soul from the karma acquired from this mistake.”
Also working against us mere mortals in our pursuit of the divine was the current period of time we live in. According to Hindu scriptures, we are living in the age of Kaliyug, the darkest period of the four periods in the world’s cycle of existence. Kaliyug started about 5,000 years ago and is going to last for about 400,000 more years. Swamiji said this age will get much darker, more evil, and more painful as it progresses.
One aspect of the faith that Swamiji was never vague about was the idea that none of us could reach God without the assistance of a God-realized saint, such as himself. He would say things like, “God is omnipresent, but we can’t find him. He’s in our hearts, but we can’t feel him. So, to help the souls he sends saints to Earth to teach them the path to Radha-Krishna.”
In the beginning, I knew nothing about Hinduism except what Swamiji taught us. I accepted his version of the religion without question and didn’t explore it further, because to question the guru would have been an unforgivable transgression. He even warned us against reading the scriptures or the writings of other gurus. “You do not have the capacity to understand the scriptures on your own,” he said, “and other people’s writings could be incorrect and poison your mind.”
